'• -^^^x^. ^^.; 







. .^^ 



" * ■'^ 






x*^<^. 



' 1 

,0 



/^^ 






■?.-, 







-^ 



» 










\^^^. 



% 






'\^ 



^■^^. .< 









o5 -^c^ 









.0'^ 



'/' 



* » , 










•^0^ = . -^ ^:^ :^.: -^ '^0^ :/ . 









#-- * 



- .\N 



%.^ 
.^^ 



>.^ 



^^' •^.. 



'o. 



•\ 















•A. -A, = \*^ O^ '- V 



•^^r^X 






"^p 




'> * p/. O'.V .IV 






o 0^ 



?^ "^^ 






\' 



.^^^ 



^%s^' 






W t I A ^^0^ tf >> \ \ . s; , ^. Oft' 



^^ * 4-7*, " '^ir^y^--''' £ = \0 <^^ 

■^ '■•'i-. * •. N 



.\^" . 



.0 



'^ 



^^■^ ^^. 



'O 



?>, * 8 I A 



THE NEW WORLD 



THE 

NEW WORLD 

PROBLEMS IN 
POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY 

By 

Isaiah Bowman, Ph.D. 

Director of the 

u4inerican Geographical Society 

of^iA(eiv Ybr]^ 

ILLUSTRATED WITH 215 MAPS 
AND WITH 65 ENGRAVINGS FROM 
PHOTOGRAPHS 



,„l«fiw.'>.VW. 




\bnkers-on-Hudson, New York 

WORLD BOOK COMPANY 
1922 



x\^^ 



WORLD BOOK COMPANY 

THE HOUSE OF APPLIED KNOW LEDGE 
Established, 1905, by Caspar W. Hodgson 

YONKERS-ON-HUDSON, NeW YoRK 

2126 Prairie Avenue, Chicago 

^ ^\\^ \ 

In an autocracy a very small political y^ /0-\ V^ 
group may take the most fateful decisions \ O O J 

respecting peace and war. In a democ- ' /^ '9 f 

racy the citizen participates in this grave ^ CA f^ 

task. It is therefore the paramount duty \ ' 

of all citizens who wish to see our civiliza- 
tion preserved and ad\ anced, to know the 
peoples about them, their problems, their 
desires, their resources, their possibilities, 
and their spirit, — in short, the political 
and geographic as well as the historic and 
economic bases of their life. Yet such in- 
formation concerning the different peoples 
and countries of the world is often hard to 
come by. and its interpretation usually 
requires an acquaintance with the sources 
of knowledge that few people possess. 
The New World is designed to provide for 
the average citizen the background of in- 
formation that is necessary to understand 
the main international questions of our 
time and to foUow their development 






PRINTED IN U. S. A. 



Copyright, 1921, by World Book Company 

Copyright in Great Britain 

All rights reserved 



PREFACE 

Whether we wish to do so or not we are obliged to take hold of 
the present world situation in one way or another. Though that 
situation is based upon a group of international problems of extraor- 
dinary complexity, opinions respecting these problems must in many 
cases be translated into immediate action on the part of govern- 
ment executives. In an autocracy the people are asked to accept 
unquestioningly the judgments of officials reputed to be wiser than 
they; in a democracy hke ours we periodically ask the voters (suddenly 
doubled in nmnber by the extension of the suffrage to women) to 
express an opinion and commit the government to a policy. 

No one can contemplate our relation to affairs with equanimity 
in view of the state of poUtical education in the United States. 
Our hitherto domestic point of view, our century-long and uninter- 
rupted success in territorial expansion, the high and false values set 
upon material wealth, even our view of party politics and the respon- 
sibiHties of party leaders, all alike increase the difficulties of a time 
beset by perils of a new order. 

To grasp the fuU meaning of questions which involve other powers 
that like ourselves have patriotic pride and the means to defend 
their honor, requires something more than native common sense and 
a wilhngness to deal fairly. For these questions have a geographical 
and historical setting and require scholarly consideration. It is to the 
roots of wrong that the voters and the constructive statesmen of our 
time must address themselves. In England and France the govern- 
ment leaders can depend upon a body of speciahsts and experienced 
administrators. In America we have never had a trained and per- 
manent foreign-office staff ; and however lofty our intentions, we work, 
so far as scholarship goes, on administrative principles little different 
from those of a hundred years ago. 

It is therefore unnecessary to elaborate an explanation for a book 
that deals with so many poHtical questions as this one. As a general 
review it is hkely to display many faults of judgment and emphasis. 
It goes without saying that no one could hope to present a wholly 
balanced account of present poUtical conditions. However, the 
attempt has been made to avoid aU but the most necessary expressions 
of editorial opinion, leaving the facts on the two sides of a given 
question to speak for themselves. Where this principle has been set 
aside, it has been for the purpose of pointing more exphcitly than 
could otherwise have been done to the gravest of existing dangers. 



vi Preface 

There are some questions that can hardly be said to have two sides, 
and there are other questions of a debatable character that require a 
judgment now and not later. 

The text has been illustrated at every turn by maps, many of them 
specially prepared for the purpose, because maps are particularly 
illuminating to many current problems of political geography. 
Furthermore, not only are many valuable pubhshed maps difficult to 
find, they are still more difficult to interpret. It seemed that a real 
service could be rendered by assembhng them and commenting upon 
the facts that they display. 

The large number of maps required and the many boundary changes 
taking place have made it impossible to represent the latest bounda- 
ries on every map, in spite of the fact that some of the maps have 
been engraved several tunes in order to have them include more recent 
decisions. Liberal cross-references are therefore given in the figure 
inscriptions and in the main text. A few of the maps represent 
conditions that may not actually be carried out, as, for example, the 
maps illustrating the treaty of Sevres between Turkey and the Allied* 
Powers, a treaty still awaiting ratification. In fact, many of the 
conditions set forth in other treaties now in force may be altered by 
later negotiation. 

There are tlu-ee personal acknowledgments which I take pleasure 
in making : to Mr. John Storck, Miss Gladys M. Wrigley, editor of 
the Geographical Review, and Miss M. A. Purcell, editor for the pub- 
lishers, all of whom gave the most inteUigent and constructive assist- 
ance. In addition I wish to thank Mr. Storck for his help in assem- 
bling the statistics and in the preparation of the maps. Thanks are 
due the officers of the American Geographical Society for interest in the 
work and for permission to use many of the original drawings, as well 
as plates, of maps which first appeared in the Geographical Review. 

1 wish also to record my great obligation to former members of the 
Conmiission of Inquiry, an exceptionally able group of scholars who 
cooperated with the American Geographical Society in forming an 
organization which had for its object the systematic collection of data 
for the use of the American government in the conference for the 
estabfislmient of peace, thus rendering an important public service 
in time of need. Further acknowledgments are made in the form of 
bibliographic notes at the end of the volmne and in the inscriptions 
beneath the maps. 

Isaiah Bolivian 

2 April 1921 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER 

I. Major Problems 

II. Problems of Imperial Britain .... 

III. Political and Colonial Aims of France 

IV. Belgium as a European Focus .... 
V. The Italian Situation 

VI. The Democratic Drift in Spain .... 

VII. Portugal's Colonial Policies .... 

VIII. The Scandinavian Countries and Holland . 

IX. Bailway and Territorial ProBLEMS of Switzerland 

X. Problems of the German People .... 

XI. The National Existence of Austria . 

XII. The New Hungary 

XIII. The Domain of the Czecho-Slovaks 

XIV. Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic .... 
XV. Bumania within Its New Frontiers 

XVI. Bulgaria under the Treaty of Neltilly 

XVII. The Albanian Mountaineers 

XVIII. The Beuinhlted Greek Lands 

XIX. Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 

XX. Lithuanian Development and Belations 

XXI. Land Tenure and Trade Outlets in Esthonia and 

Latvia — the Former Baltic Provinces 

XXII. Finnish Problems in Their Geographical Setting 

-s5«9^XXIII. The Political Geography of Bussia 

XXIV. Constantinople and Its Thoroughfare 

XXV. Palestine : A Jewish Homeland under a British Man 

DATARY 

XXVI. Anatolia : Last Bemnant of the Turkish Empije 

XXVII. The Mountain Home of the Kurds 

XXVIII. The Transcaucasian Peoples . . . 

XXIX. Persia in Belation to British Intefjests 

XXX. Inner Asia : The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 

XXXI. The Far East 

XXXII. The Pacific Bealm and Australia 

XXXIII. African Colonies of the European Powers 

XXXIV. Latin-Amepican Tfade and Boundary Disputes : Be 

lations to the United States .... 

Bibliogfaphy 

Appendix : Principal Treaties and Agreements, 1814-1920 . 
Index 



1 
12- 

77- 
119 
129 
145 
156 
165 
181 
186' 
206 
216 
231 
249 
278 
295 
306' 
313 
328 
3571^^" 

362 
370 
376 • 
409 

418 

425 

444 

450 

462 

470- 

490 

520 

532 

559 
583 
599 
605 



THE NEW WORLD 

PROBLEMS IN POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY 
CHAPTER ONE 

MAJOR PROBLEMS 

The effects of the Great War are so far-reaching that we shaU have 
henceforth a new world. Shaken violently out of their former 
routine, people everywhere have created or adopted new ideas and 
new material arrangements. Yet the student of history sees in 
this period of change but a step in an age-old process ; to him the 
effects of the war are as new ingredients dropped into the caldron of 
humanity. The world is not new in the sense that war has ceased, 
that all political and social problems will be promptly settled, that 
present international boundaries and economic arrangements will 
forever remain unchanged. The qualities of selfish ambition and envy 
are deep-seated ; they will pass away only when human life itself is 
extinguished. So long as they exist there will be war, with its revo- 
tionary effects upon political, social, and economic life. 

Man's mental qualities and reactions change but little; they 
repeat certain effects from age to age. Almost every event of our 
time has its counterpart in history. The officials of the Roman 
Empire faced problems strikingly like our own, whether they relate 
to land ownership and distribution, the burden of taxes, the drift of 
country folk to the city, growing love for material wealth and pleas- 
ure, or the rise of political problems of a magnitude beyond the power 
of individual rulers. Each age has had its grand catastrophe, its 
great war. We call the late war Armageddon, but historians have 
long called the battle of Leipzig (1813) the "Battle of the Nations." 

After each crisis humanity has set itseff vigorously to work 
recasting its world. This it is now struggling to do after the years 
of war just left behind. Like the great geologic eras of earth history, 
the new age dates from a period of general change in habit of life. 
Our political and social environment has been revolutionized. We 
now look out upon world problems and alien peoples, almost unknown 
to us until yesterday, in a spirit akin to that of Europeans four cen- 
turies ago, when they stood at the threshold of the Age of Discovery. 
Everywhere men have been stirred by new ideas. The new era will 



2 



The New World 



date from the years of the World War just as medieval Europe dates 
from the fall of Rome, or as the modern democratic era dates from the 
Declaration of Independence. 

What are some of the new problems of the world ? 

Whatever the faults of the old world, it was at least what a busi- 
ness man would call a "going concern"; can the new world be 
set going in an orderly manner ? 

How much of the old world is left ? 

What new boundaries, concessions, colonies, mandataries, spheres 
of influence, and protectorates now appear on the map of the world ? 

What kind of people compose the new states ? 

Will the new democracies survive, — in Poland and Jugo-Slavia 
and Austria, for example, — or are some of the experiments in 
self-government hkely to fail ? 

What elements of economic strength and weakness has each of 
the new states, and also each of the old states whose resources 
have been either increased or diminished by treaty ? 

The large and powerful states — the ''great powers'' — have, from 
this time forward, a new set of rights and responsibilities. How will 
these responsibilities be met ? 

Will the strong states administer their colonies or protectorates 
in the interest of the natives ? 

Could the grip of the large "western" powers be loosened without 
anarchy following in the "protected" or "occupied" regions 
of the world, like Egypt (British), Santo Domingo (United 
States), Morocco (French)? 

Can the terrible burden of armaments be reduced by common 
agreement ? 

Has the day of deliverance come for the oppressed minorities of the 
earth, those who have hitherto been persecuted because of differ- 
ences between themselves and the majority or ruhng class in race, 
religion, or social customs ? 

How far can the protection of minorities be carried ? Can the so- 
called minorities treaties stand, or do they threaten the mtegrity 
of the unwilling signatory states — Poland, Czecho-Slovakia, 
Rumania, Jugo-Slavia, and Greece ? 

Will strong-nations continue the struggle for trade privileges, raw 
materials, and strategic zones, with the prospect of war between 
them if they cannot realize their commercial and political am- 
bitions otherwise ? 



Major Problems 3 

In short, will the changes in the political and economic geography 
of the world spell peace or war, strength or weakness, in the years im- 
mediately before us? 



These are vital problems for every nation. By reason of some zones of 

friction 
lengthened 



of them war may come, not in a generation, but in a few years, ^"^tion 



The danger spots of the world have been greatly increased in 
number, the zones of friction lengthened. Where there were ap- 
proximately 8000 miles of old boundary about the former states of 
central Europe, there are now 10,000 miles, and of this total more 
than 3000 miles represent newly located boundaries. Every addi- 
tional mile of new boundary, each new location, has increased for 
a time the sources of possible trouble between unlike and, in the main, 
unfriendly peoples. Nor have neighboring peoples yet learned to 
look upon the new boundaries as final limits ; for it takes time to 
adjust a nation's thought and hfe to a new frontier. 

Hatreds have been intensified by the cruelties of the war, and one 
of the chief problems is that of restoring a state of friendship in the 
world. This wiU be diflicult for all, but especially for weak, ignorant, 
and quarrelsome people. In some countries conditions of hfe and 
morality are even worse than before. A Syrian recently expressed this 
state of things in striking terms : " Once I wept aU day long : now I 
weep for that day." 

When the lovely windows of Rheims cathedral were broken into Rheims 
thousands of pieces and scattered through the streets, the people ^^^^^^^^} ^ 

^.. ^ ' ^ia symbol of 

at once began collecting the pieces. Every fragment that could be the world 
found, no matter how tiny, was carefuUy laid aside against the day 
when the pieces would be fitted together again and the windows 
restored. 

Rheims cathedral and its broken windows are a symbol of the 
world. A few years ago the world was orderly. To be sure, it was 
not perfect; some of its problems were exceedingly difficult and 
perplexing. Then hke a thunderclap came the war and the terrible 
suffering and wreck of war. About some of the world's peoples now 
he the ruins of their former hfe, and they are trying to piece them 
together again. Even in the United States, remote though it be, 
the evil effects are manifold. No American, however secluded his 
hfe, however distant his home from the big cities and the coasts, 
is free from the consequences of the World War. The world is 
broken ; its international Hfe is disrupted ; it is in a state of general 
economic disorder. 



The New World 




Fig. 1. Overlapping territorial claims in central Europe. Claims are represented not in their 
most extreme but in their more conservative forms ; in general, therefore, the ethnic line is taken 
as the limit of the claims of Austria and Hungary ; the eastern limit of Poland's claim as shown 
on the map is some distance west of her boundary in 1772 (see Figure 166), etc. The districts 
are numbered as follows : 



1. Part of Austrian Tyrol 

2. German-Slovene borderland 

3. German Hungary 

4. Istria and Dalmatia 
6. Valona 

6. Northern Epirus 

7. Serbo- Albanian zone 

8. Western Thrace 

9. Eastern Thrace and the area claimed by 

Greece in Asia Minor 

10. Southern Dobrudja 

11. Western Bulgaria (See Fig. 153) 

12. Southern Banat 

13. Northern Banat 

14. Southern Hungary 
1.5. Western Transj'lvania 

16. Eastern Ruthenia and Bessarabia 

17. Southern Slovakia 



18. Southern Bohemia 

19- German Bohemia 

20- Czech districts in German Silesia 

21. Teschen, Orawa, and Spits (named in 

order from west to east) 

22. Ruthenia 

23. Upper Silesia, Posen, Danzig, Marien- 

werder, and Allenstein 

24. Polish-Russian border zone 

25. Lithuanian-Pohsh-Ru-ssian border zone 

26. Polish-Lithuanian border zone 

27. Trans-Niemen territory 

28. Saar basin 

29. Malmedy, Eupen, and Moresnet 

30. Southern Limburg 
31- Luxemburg 

32. Northern Slesvig 



Major Problems 5 

THE NEW MAP OF THE WORLD 

A map of the new world is a picture of one of the most important Maps as 
results of the war. Most people think of a map as a fixed thing, pictures of 
On the contrary it is almost as changeful as mankind itself. Two era, chang- 
kinds of changes are constantly taking place, the first of which is h"sto^^ 
brought about by scientific explorations. It was only a short time 
ago that the south-polar region and much of central Africa were 
blanks on the map. Thus the map grows with our knowledge of the 
world's geography. The second kind of change is brought about by 
the changing fortunes of nations. The boundaries of the different 
countries have never long remained fixed in history. "Frontiers 
are snapshots of the life of nations." It was with a great deal of 
astonishment and anxiety that many people saw the old landmarks 
suddenly disappear in 1919. The world was at one of the turning 
points of its career ; new nations sprang up ; men began to talk about 
a New Europe. 

SOME BASIC CAUSES OF THE COMPLEX PROBLEMS OF THE WORLD 

So far as Europe and western Asia are concerned, the current The "twi- 
problems would be much easier to solve if people of different kinds ^^^^* ^°°®^ 
were not so intimately mixed in broad belts on their common fron- 
tiers. Sharp hnes of division between groups differing in race, re- 
ligion, or language are the exception, not the rule. Thus .arise dis- 
putes as to the disposition of mixed zones, each side claiming to have 
a majority. These areas have often been referred to as the "twi- 
light zones," or "gray zones," phrases expressing doubtful character. 
Eastern Galicia (Fig. 167) is such a region of mixed population; in 
general the Poles live in or near the towns and the Ruthenians oc- 
cupy the country districts. Another region of mixed population is 
Macedonia (Fig. 159) ; another is the Dobrudja (Fig. 143). In a 
portion of Transcaucasia, Armenians and Tatars are so inter- 
mingled that to avoid the rule of one people by another they 
signed a special treaty in 1919 providing for joint administration 
of certain mixed zones. 

For many years we had almost forgotten that religion forms one 
of the world's major problems, not merely because there is a con- 
test between the various religions for supremacy, but also and chiefly 
because religion, from its nature or through its use by ambitious 
rulers or peoples, may become a political force. Mohammedanism, for 
example, has always been feared in this respect, because its followers 
are taught to carry its message to unbelievers even by fire and sword. 



The New World 



Religion 
also a 
world prob- 
blem 




Fig. 2. The territorial reorganization of central Europe and the Near East. The numbered 
areas are as follows : 1, Left Bank of the Rhine; 2, Saar district ; 3, Danzig Free Citj' (or State) ; 
4, Zone of the Straits ; 5, Syria, under French mandate ; 6, Mesopotamia, under British mandate ; 
7, Zone of possible Arab state extending southward into Arabia and related to both French and 
British spheres of interest. For more detailed maps on larger scales see the appropriate chap- 
ters that follow. For the boundaries of the Free State of Fiume see Figure 139. The original 
plebiscite arrangements for Teschen, Orawa, and Spits on the northern border of Czecho-Slovakia 
were later set aside (Fig. 179). For the Tripartite agreement (southern Anatolia) see Figure 48. 

It is a religion of force and political authority, and we have nothing 
with which to compare it in the Christian rehgion except the forcible 
conversion of the American Indians in the days of Spanish coloniza- 
tion or of the barbarians of the eastern Baltic lands by the Teutonic 
Knights. In Russia, the national rehgion (Greek Orthodox) and the 
state were long inseparable ideas, and the Czar was the head of the 
church ; but there was little politico-religious proselytizing and no fanat- 
ical spirit. Religious motives in the Mohammedan world are important 
in relation to French and British policy in the eastern Mediterranean 
and particularly along the road to India (pages 54 to 57). Islam, 
to use another name for Mohammedanism, is a religion that has mil- 
lions of converts each year, chiefly among low-grade populations, such 
as thekegroes of central Africa. 



Major Problems 



THE FORM OF THE PRESENT PROBLEMS 



The problems following this war are very much more complicated oid prob 



lems now 
compli- 
cated by 
new de- 
sires 



than those of any preceding time. The old causes of trouble, wliich 
had their roots in the unequal geographical conditions and in the jeal- 
ousies of different dynasties, are complicated by a general desire for 
better living conditions and by a universal unrest and dissatisfaction 
with present social and pohtical forms. There has been growing, 
chiefly in Russia, an internationalist movement, and we have seen 
it in the form of Bolshevism carry devastation and fear into every 
corner of old Russia. It has sent its agents abroad to carry its revo- 
lutionary behefs into peaceful communities and even into the democ- 
racies of the western world. 

In addition we have local problems that, put together, give the Even the 
leaders of each nation the greatest concern. Everywhere through- I^*^^^ p"""^- 

- - . - , lems serious 

out the world labor is demanding shorter hours and larger pay. In 




Fia. 3. Note the religious differences between Russians and the people of the western border 
states that have broken away to form independent national units. The creation of Poland adds 
a powerful unit to the Roman Catholic bloc. International boundaries as in 1920 (for eastern 
Poland, Finland, and Rumania see Figures 182; 144, and 188 respectively). Boundaries of 
religions after Debes, Handailas. 



8 



The New World 



New and 
broader 
issues in 
place of 
the old 



Varying 
and en- 
tangled 
causes of 
change 



Causes 
of the World 
War of 
1914-1918 



many countries peasants are taking possession of the large estates 
and dividing the land. Nations large and small are anxious about 
their frontiers and the stability of the arrangements resulting from 
the treaties following the World War. There is fear of trouble from 
the unlike populations that are included with the majorities of many 
states. Everywhere there is general anxiety lest the present disor- 
ganization of the world should lead to still greater economic distress. 

The early issues of the war have long since changed their aspect. 
Only to mention the outstanding persons and events of the years of 
war is to see how httle concern there is with them at the present time. 
Their place is taken by larger and more enduring interests. The new 
interests consist of geographical, social, and poUtical problems that 
affect the entire world. They may be thought of as due, at least 
in large part, to world disorganization. From a state of high ideahsm 
maintained during much of the war, men have passed into a state of 
realism. They are not seeking an opportunity for service so much as 
an opportunity for gain. The spirit of team-play that prevailed during 
the war has in too many instances changed to a spirit of extreme and 
dangerous individuahsm. Too many men are fiercely impatient with 
the necessary routine of hfe. On them the lessons of the war have 
been largely lost. Until a new atmosphere has been created, the world 
wiU remain disorganized, unstable, dangerous. 

In studying the changes that take place in the map of the world, 
we shall do well to keep before us at all times how complicated are the 
current causes of change in national boundaries. In the past these 
causes have been hardly less complex. Sometimes it was the personal 
ambition of a king or of the nobility that altered the frontier of a nation. 
Sometimes it was the pressure of a hungry population. Sometimes 
it was one of those great periodic migrations or waves of people that 
have swept from Inner Asia into the eastern and central districts of 
Europe. Sometimes it was rehgion, as in the spread of Mohammedan- 
ism from the 12th to the 15th centuries. And sometimes, as in the 
recent war, it was a great group of comphcated factors very difficult to 

disentangle. 

It was not the death of a Grand Duke at Sarajevo or the invasion 
of Belgium, nor was it the ambitions of the German ruler or the Pan- 
German dreams of the German Junkers — it was not any one of these 
things that produced the war. It was a combination of all of them, 
colored by a desire to control the seats of production and the channels 
of transportation of all those products, hke coal and oil and hemp 
and cotton and iron and steel and manganese, that are the founda- 



Major Problems 



00 Tf 




10 



The New World 



^F^^ 






SWEDtN-lr O 



UNITED - I I 
KINGDOM BJU 



LUXEM6G.-lr -i IPf ^ 
H> SWmrn AUSTRIA- 

i u^ c "0^ Ir C ml 

FRANCE 1 ITALY 

FRANCE i. pjjj,^ 

ALGERIA -^ 




i. 



Siberia 



feyl 



U_L 



"^ 



^. 



^ '"iClr-'C 
< ■'■ JAPAN 



-MlA 



%; 



r 



•s^. ■: BORNEj}' 



PRODUCTION 

I 1 

ir Iron ore c Coal 

CONSUMPTION 

D 



Oil 



Fig. 5. Cartogram to show world distribution of the three leading industrial minerals. Figures 
represent percentages of the world's total in 1913. Data from the United States Geological 
Survey. 



Lack 
of agree- 
ment as to 
the objects 
of the war 
and the 
peace 
treaties 



tions of the modern industrial world. These commodities may become 
sources of unrivaled power, and in the hands of unscrupulous men 
or nations they may be used for the devastation of the entire world. 
And by this we do not mean merely the destruction of its material 
wealth, but also the destruction of its political and religious liberty. 

To the general difficulties of the present there are added many 
regional or local difficulties, which have now reached a climax in a rest- 
less and experimental world. Added to these causes is the confusion 
that has arisen respecting the objects of the Wcu* and of the peace 
treaties. With the whole fabric of society torn and disfigured, it 
was natural that there should be many divergencies of opinion as to 
the means by which it could be restored. To some the war meant 
poUtical freedom; to others, the liberation of oppressed minorities. 
The "freedom of the seas" meant one thing to Germany and another 
to England. "Self-determination" to one group in Russia meant 
independence, to another autonomy, to a third the rule of the pro- 
letariat. One soldier from America might hope for better working 
conditions at home, while another thought only of helping France, 
or beating Germany, or possibly a glorious adventure, or a chance 
to follow the invisible banners of the spirit. Men suffered and died 
for different objects. 

When the peace treaties came to be framed, each person hoped 
to have his special object achieved; otherwise he would be disap- 



Major Problems 11 

pointed. Add to the numerous disappointments the growing con- 
fusion resulting from the bitterly contested war that involved nearly 
the whole world, and it is not hard to understand that any settle- 
ment would have a far greater number of unfriendly critics than 
supporters. This will be true also of many of the international 
policies, agreements, and treaties of the immediate future, whether 
they relate to frontiers, conunercial opportunities, or the forms of 
govenmient. 

Because it is inhabited by imperfect human beings, the world has 
always had its causes of friction and its downright wrongs. These 
things the wise men of all times have tried to adjust. But complete 
success will never be attained. The evolutionary struggle that 
marked the rise of mankind from the primitive to the present state 
wiU long continue. Taking it by and large, this is a competitive 
world, and to the costs of ordinary competition must be added 
the cost of the supreme competition of war. National and racial 
ambitions, hatreds, and rivalries will continue to the end of time, 
though they may be reduced in scope and intensity. 

While it is important to face these facts, it is far more important Practi- 
that men's minds should be turned to experimentation in the field cai value 

^01 exist- 

of cooperative plans. The world has had many leagues of nations ing inter- 
in principle. The present proposal is set in high relief by the colossal agre°e^*^ 
losses of the war. For example, we had a working league of nations ments 
when practically the entire world combined against Germany and her 
associates ; and in the future, whether or not the League of Nations 
in its present form continues, new leagues will have to be formed 
when new needs arise. The great practical value of an international 
court of justice and of experiments in the field of international labor, 
international postal regulations and patent agreements, the inter- 
national exchange of data on statistical sources and agriculture, and 
other modes of promoting international exchange of ideas has been 
demonstrated. By slow stages, through more general education, and 
especially through the influence in each generation of a few wise, far- 
seeing, and practical men, sound cooperative plans may be further 
developed to the point of reducing the causes of international trouble. 
But the world's peoples are still fundamentally unhke, and the road to 
success passes through a wilderness of experiment. 



CHAPTER TWO 



PROBLEMS OF IMPERIAL BRITAIN 



Despite the great colonial empires once held by France and Spain 
and the wide distribution of their holdings, it is the people of Eng- 
lish speech who have been the most persistent colonial organizers of 
modern times. Though they have frequently abused native rights, 
they have nevertheless been the most successful in their use of native 
help in managing the affairs of colonies of different race. This is true 
of American rule in the Philippines and Porto Rico as well as of 
the government of British colonies. Their sense of responsibiUty is 
alert. It is because their navies are powerful that the sea is free. In 
the common language they speak and write there is a bond of po- 
litical significance. Both have a traditional tendency toward liberal 
government. 

Among English-speaking nations the two most powerful com- 
mercially, the United Kingdom and the United States, have a com- 
bined naval strength which comprises nearly 75 per cent of the world's 
total. This is a matter of the gravest importance, for in the past 
few years we have seen much of the world thrown into a state bordering 
on anarchy, and if the process continues or at some future time recurs, 
it may be that the sea lanes and distant strategic points on the rim 
of civilization can be held only if there be a powerful and mobile fleet. 
For these reasons, we shall wish to see first of all how the World War 
and the peace treaties have affected lands governed by the English. 

The territorial inflation of Great Britain as a result of the World 
War is a source of real danger to her. So widespread and varied are 
British possessions that conmiercial, racial, and rehgious convulsions, 
no matter in what part of the world they take place, impinge upon 
the interests of Britain. Even before the war her territory was suffi- 
ciently widespread to test her capacity for government ; and in the past 
few years she has assumed new obligations which involve enormously 
heavy financial and military expenditures. The treaty with Persia 
requires Great Britain to give mihtary advice and other aid to that 
country. Holding Mesopotamia and Egypt and Palestine means 
cultivating good relations with the Arabs. Thus in the Near East 
alone Britain has added to her former responsibifities an area of 800,000 
square miles, with a population of 12,000,000. 

British possessions are so distributed that they He chiefly about 
the borders of the Atlantic and Indian oceans, and it is on these 
two oceans that British commerce is of greatest importance (Fig. 7). 

12 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



13 




14 



The New World 



This distribution has also given Great Britain advantages in naval 
strategy, since the lines of communication are relatively short and are 
marked by an admirable series of harbors. 

It is remarkable co what degree the possessions of Great Britain, 
a maritime power, are protected on their landward side against in- 
vasion from continental interiors. In the case of the British Isles 
and Australia, this protection comes from insularity. In India the 
continental frontier is formed by a great mountain barrier; Egypt 
is in part set off from the rest of Africa by desert country ; and 'South 
Africa is protected by the great Kalahari Desert, north of which is 
the barrier of a tropical forest thrown halfway across the continent. 
As a great naval power, Japan might be thought to have an advantage 
over Great Britain in Australasia and India, which are nearer to 
Japan than to Great Br'tain. But this advantage of nearness is in 
turn offset by the maritime supremacy of the British Empire as a 
whole and of the British Isles in particular. Finally, the territories 
of France, Belgium, Portugal, and the United States — four friendly 
nations — flank the possessions of the British Empire more extensively 
than do the lands of other powers. 

The size and population of the British Empire have trebled in the 
past seventy years, as the following table shows : 

Growth of the British Empire 



Date 


Abea in Square Miles 


Population 


1800 


1,500,000 

4,500.000 

11,300,000 

13,700,000 


20,000,000 


1850 


160,000,000 


1900 


390,000,000 


1919 


475,000,000 







The empire now contains well over one quarter of the land surface 
and population of the globe, and its possessions are so distributed 
that they give England access to raw materials vital not merely 
to the success of her commercial fleet, but vital also to the great host 
of industries upon which depends the welfare of the British people. 
The table on page 15 gives a comparative view of the great stock of 
raw materials available to British manufacturers within the British 
Empire. 

In the distribution of enemy territory at the close of the war, Great 
Britain won the largest share, and with her gains in land go imnortant 
gains in material wealth. Mesopotamia has rich oil deposits. Tangan- 
yika Territory, as that part of former German East Africa now under 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



15 



Raw Materials within the British Empire, 1914 ^ 

The figures given are the approximate averages for four (or five) normal pre-war years. 



Commodity " 


Annual consumption of 
United Kingdom (with 
% from British i,mpire) 


Annual production 
within the empire 


Annual consump- 
tion within tlie 
empire 


Chief sources of supply within 
the empire 


Antimony (metal) 


6000 tons (10 %) 


1000 tons 




Australia- (output curtailed by 
development of Chinese 
deposits). Mexican supply 
(2000 tons) in British 
hands. 


Asbestos . . . 


160,000 cwt. (60%) 


1,784,000 cwt. 




Canada furnishes 80% of 
world's supply, and more 
than enough for the empire. 


Borax .... 


10,000 tons 




12,000 tons 


British corporation controls 
important fields in Argen- 
tina and Peru. 


Butter .... 


6,500,000 cwt. (55%) 






The supply is insufficient. 
Australia and New Zealand 
pre the chie producers. 


Cheese. . . , 


2,900,000 cwt. (80%) 






C anada supplies 50% of con- 
sumption of U. K. 


Chromium (ore) . 


No data 






Rhodesia supplies over 40% 
of world's production. 


Cobalt .... 


No data 






Canada is chief source of 
world's supply. 


Copper (metal) . 


120,000 tons (25%) 


87,000 tons 


150,000 tons 


Australia (50% ) ; Canada 
(40%). 


Cotton .... 


1.000,000 tons (20%) 


1,250,000 tons 




India produces over J of total, 
but much of her production 
is not suitable for the Brit- 
ish industry. Egypt pro- 
duces high-grade cotton. 


Fertilizers . . . 


600,000 tons 




850,000 tons 


No important empire sources. 


Graphite . . . 


16,000 tons (45%) 


31,500 tons 


17,000 tons 


Ceylon produces the world's 
best graphite. 


Iron (pig) . . 


8,600,000 tons (70%) 


5,800,000 tons 


10,000,000 tons 


United Kingdom (80%); 
Canada (15%). 


Lead .... 


180,000 tons (25%) 


155,000 tons 


212,000 tons 


Large resources in Burma are 
being developed. 


Manganese (ore) 


430,000 tons (45%) 


600,000 tons 




India could easily supply the 
empire's needs. 


Mercury . . . 


600 tons 




850 tons 


No important empire sources. 


Nickel .... 


No data 


22,000 tons 




Canada can supply the em- 
pire's needs, though her 
deposits are controlled by 
American capital. 


Platinum . . . 


35,000 oz. 




37,000 oz. 


No important empire sources. 


Sulphur . . . 


370,000 cwt. 




1,750,000 cwt. 


No important empire sources. 


Thorium . . . 


35-50 tons 


120 tons 




India produces 100 tons, 
formerly in German control. 


Tin 


20,000 tons (60%) 


81,500 tons 


27,000 tons 


Straits Settlements (80%); 
Nigeria, United Kingdom, 
Australia (about 5% each). 


Tungsten (ore) . 


No data 


3,700 tons 




India and Australia each pro- 
duce about 30%, and the 
Malay States a little less. 


Wheat .... 


195,830,000 bu. (50%) 


705,000,000 bu. 


736,000,000 bu. 


India (50%) ; Canada^(25%) ; 
AustraUa (10%); United 
Kingdom (5%). 


Wood pulp . . 


844,000 tons (10%) 


1,260,000 tons 




Practically all from Canada. 


Wool .... 


566,000,000 lbs. (80%) 


1,246,000.000 lbs. 


650,000,000 lbs. 


Australia (60% ) ; New Zea- 
land (15%); South Africa 
(10%); United Kingdom 
(10%). 


Zinc .... 


194,000 tons 


235,000 tons 


200,000 tons 


Australia is by far the most 
important (90% ) ; promis- 
ing deposits in India also. 



^ Coal and petroleum are not included. See Figs. 4 and 5. 

' The commodities of the table are indicated in three styles of type : boldface, representing those which 
are produced in quantities sufficient to supply the needs of the empire ; italics, those which could be developed 
to the point of supplying the needs of the empire ; and ordinary type, those for which the empire will have to 
depend in part upon outside sources. 



16 



The New World 



Material 
gains as 
a result of 
the war 



To pay the 
huge war 
debt indus- 
trial reor- 
ganization 
required 



a British mandate is called, has a large labor supply and valuable 
fibers, oils, cereals, and cattle ranges. Those parts of Togoland and 
the Cameroons gained by Great Britain have rich resources in palm 
oil. Nauru, in the Pacific, has valuable phosphate deposits. Kaiser 
Wilhehn's Land, now added to British New Guinea, has petroleum, 
copra, and pearl fisheries. With all these assets go strategic and poHt- 
ical advantages, as well as increased coafing and cable station facilities 
of direct benefit to the entire British trade organization. 

In the industrial revolution that changed western Europe com- 
pletely, England took the lead, and she has held it in the hundred- 
and-fif ty-year period since the beginning of that revolution. This she 
could not have done if she had not had within the boundaries of the 
empire a large part of the raw materials that she required. Trade 
became the fife blood of the British Empire. 

Before the period of colonization, England was drawing the prin- 
cipal material for shipbuilding from northern Europe, and it was 
always a matter of anxiety to her that her sources of supply might 
be taken away. This was one of the strong reasons for colonizing 
America, where she could find an abundant supply of materials for 
shipbuilding. "Her shipping was to England like the hair of Samson, 
the secret of her national strength." The extension of this pohcy led 
England into the adoption of pohtical principles of most far-reaching 
consequences, for in seeking raw materials of every sort Great Britain's 
activities and claims collided at many points with those of the other 
industrial nations of the world. 

(A) Trade Organization of the Empire 

There is a particular aspect of the British economic and political 
situation that we need to examine before taking up the problems 
of the empire in detail. How is the organized commercial life of 
Great Britain to be continued under the great strain of feeding and 
clothing England's industrial millions at the same time that an enor- 
mous war debt is paid ? The map of the United Kingdom (Fig. 8) 
shows how remarkably concentrated is the industrial population, and 
how closely dependent upon coal. The people engaged in agriculture 
in England compose but 6 per cent of the population, while in 
France they form 40 per cent, in Italy 35 per cent, in Russia 72 per 
cent, in Jugo-Slavia 80 per cent. In general, the people of the British 
Isles five in dense agglomerations, and their welfare is bound up 
with coal, iron, and steel, the freedom of sea routes, and the right 
to trade wherever they choose. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



17 




18 



The New World 



RELATION OF ^ 

CITIES TO COALFIELDS 

m THE 

BRITISH ISLES 

SIZE OF CITIES 1911 
• 100 OOO O 500 000 
I 20O 000 ® 800 000 




Rq. 8. 



Outline map showing the relation of cities to coal fields in the British 
Mark Jefferson, in the Geographical Review, Vol. 4, 1917. 



I. From 



Conflict of 

trading 

principles 



PREFERENTIAL TARIFFS 

One of the most acute problems of Great Britain grew out of her 
attitude toward tariffs. England maintained throughout the modern 
commercial period a free-trade policy to which her whole commercial 
system became adjusted. It had aspects of serious international im- 
portance. England wished to see her goods admitted into the world's 
trade areas, regardless of political ownership, on terms of equality 
with those of all other powers. In carrying out this pohcy her interests 



Problems of Imperial Britain 19 

ran counter to those of other countries, which impose a tariff upon 
imported goods for high revenue, or for the protection of their own 
industries, or, for the exclusion of the trade of commercial rivals. In 
her own colonies Great Britain threw open her doors to the mer- 
chants of all countries on terms more liberal than those of any of the 
other great colonizing powers except Holland and Germany. 

In pursuing her free-trade policy, England at length found herself colonial 
in opposition to her own colonies. For example, the Australian Jo^BrlS 
colonies fought the principle of free trade, and in 1873 were permitted tariff regu- 
by law to make such tariff arrangements as they deemed best with 
other British colonies. While the colonies found it almost impossible 
to take advantage of the opportunity this created, owing to mutual 
rivalries and differences in degree of economic development that 
would make any tariff law bear unequally upon the different regional 
industries, yet the principle had been won, and it was never relin- 
quished. It became part of a general plan for winning equality of 
privilege with the mother country, and eventually it led to the accept- 
ance by British leaders of the fact that a general preferential agreement, 
or commercial union of the empire on terms of absolute equality for 
each of its parts, was the one sure way of keeping the empire intact. 
To allow the self-governing dominions to continue to make tariff 
treaties with foreign states would be to invite in some degree dis- 
crimination against English trade. 

England's general policy as well as the nationalistic pohcies of its The new 
self-governing units have both been modified. After full discussion, prance 
a plan was put into force, called the British Finance Act, effective on Act 
1 September 1919. This act applies the new preferential rates of 
duty to all the British dominions outside of Great Britain and Ire- 
land and also to British India, the Indian native states, and all British 
protectorates. Any territories that may have come under the pro- 
tection of the British government subsequently to the date of going 
into force of the act, or any territory which Great Britain may ' 
administer under a mandate of the League of Nations, may have 
the act in question applied to it by an Order in Council. The pref- 
erential rates apply to almost all goods subject to customs duties 
which are proved to be consigned from, grown, manufactured, or 
produced within the British Empire. 

In the same way American goods have preferential treatment in 
Porto Rico and the Philippines ; that is, they are admitted duty free 
or with only a light import tax, while those of other nations pay a 
heavier tax. According to the British plan, a country that is willing 



20 



The New World 




Problems of Imperial Britain 



21 




o to 



■^ ^ 



03 g 









^=3 



The New World 



The process, 
of empire 
building 



to extend to the British Empire the advantages of free trade, will in 
turn be able to trade with any country in the British Empire on the 
same terms. ^ In the application of this principle it is not intended 
that there shall be a general policy of protection, except in the case 
of new industries. The new plan will greatly expand trade within 
the empire, decrease British dependence upon foreign states, and 
extend the development of internal resources and communications. 
It is also expected to increase the social and economic unity of the 
empire. 

The growth of the British Empire depends upon a large num- 
ber of factors, some geographic, others historic or social or economic. 
For centuries Great Britain has been gaining experience in colonial 
administration. Each year large numbers of her young men enter the 
consular and diplomatic service. To do so they are required to pass a 
very rigid examination ; the best of the applicants are chosen. Thus 
is formed a caste of officials from schools and colleges with similar 
purposes. A fraternal spirit with a strong imperial tinge is the result. 
Every official has been drilled in the principles of empire building. 
He goes out to the imperial frontiers, his mind well stored with the 
traditions of his race, eager to win every possible trade advantage. 



World trade 
a vital 
matter to 
Great 
Britain 



British 
capital, in- 
dustry, and 
trade in the 
colonial 
possessions 



THE SEA POWER OF GREAT BRITAIN AND IMPERIAL DEVELOPMENT 

The British view of fair conditions of trade as embodied in the old 
free-trade principle and the new preferential tariff was the natural 
outgrowth of the rise of English sea power. BoUvia, for instance, 
does not contend for claims hke those of the Enghsh, because she has 
no colonies and no fleet. After the last threat of disaster to Eng- 
lish power had passed, mora than a hundred years ago, with the fall 
of Napoleon, the coast lines of the world became the frontiers of 
Britain. The men of England came to think more and more in terms 
of universal or world trade ; any barrier to the freest and fullest exer- 
cise of trade rights was at once an object of concern ; the larger Eng- 
land's commercial fleet and interests became, the more inclusive be- 
came her demands. 

British merchants centuries ago had founded numerous plantations 
and then colonies; the British flag was recognized over "protected" 
and "occupied" regions in Africa, India, the Caribbean, and the 
Pacific. With the growth of industry based on coal for fuel. Great 
Britain passed the next crisis in her history, during the second half 

1 A recent agreement with France provides equEility of treatment of British and French 
investors in the colonies of either power. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



28 







C a) • 



M o3 ' 

'^^ ™-i .2 ^^ oi 
g ^ M - ^ 

o o '-' " P. 
*^-^ a» o3 a> 

o o ■3 1^ ,^ 
-a (M ^* 



ti 5 c 



"*t S '^ c 2 -H- 



t-i 13 






Sao a)^ i 



cc 



o -^ 






o-H S 
Iz; § -^ 

O »H Q 

13 O O 



•*"-£ S"^ 2i 

O ft 3 C ft S 

g g 03 ^W 

^ " ^ (D CO T3 

O O O H OJ '^ 
-*^ o o 02 .. 

•e 42 T3 „• «= 

Iz; Ki* t^ •- o S 

O O !> cl . 

ai • -< 03 >-i - rfi 



rG ta ^ 'V 



'o-^ 



"sW 



a 3.2 



d ■+=> 



o1| 

-P t« s 
M Q o ^ 

C 



F^ W CW 1^ 111 P« 

o .ti -3 -^ S J 

J2 S f= m O ~ 



o3 c 



(1) *" 3 



H^ 






24 The New World 

of the 19th century, when successful continued occupation of remote 
lands depended upon the exchange ot manufactured goods for raw 
materials. English capital flowed into the trade regions, to build 
railways, ports, and canals, and to buy land. English shipping 
carried more than half the trade of all the seas. London became the 
financial capital of the world. 
The coal Ih Still uiorc rcccut times the growth of the coal export business 

fleets of jjg^g further increased the commercial and naval power of Britain. 

Britain it • i i o • • 

British-owned coahng stations are located at scores oi strategic points. 
Wherever the fleet may be, there is always fuel for it; and, more 
important, there is always a cargo for the freight steamer that 
otherwise would go out empty, or nearly so, to a distant port for 
cotton or oil or hemp or wool or food to bring back to the close- 
packed, industrial populations of England. 
British The Indian Ocean became a British lake. There was forged a great 

power ex- EngKsh chain stretching from Gibraltar to Nigeria, past Walvis Bay 
the At- in Southw est Africa, down past Cape Town, up to Zanzibar in East 
toe^Padfic Africa, onward to the coast of Arabia and Baluchistan. After 
the Opium War, Great Britain obtained Hongkong from China 
(1842) ; Queen Victoria was made Empress of India in 1876 ; 
Germany in 1890 agreed to recognize British rights in Zanzibar; 
the Boers were conquered in 1902 ; the British sphere of influence 
in Persia was recognized by Russia in 1907 — to mention only a 
few of the important steps in the progress of British empire 
building in the last few decades. 

Singapore is one of the commercial and strategic outposts of the 
British Empire that illustrates perhaps best of all the significant lo- 
cation of many outlying British possessions. It occupies an unrivaled 
position in the center of a vast area from which tropical products 
come and in which textiles and other manufactured goods are ab- 
sorbed in large quantities. As a naval base it guards the sea road to 
the Far East from southern Asia, commands the Dutch East Indies, 
is part of the outer defense of India, and is of almost equal impor- 
tance in the protection of Austraha. Strategically it is to Asia what 
Key West is to the United States. 

With her interests so vitally connected with the sea, it is natural 
that Great Britain should have been anxious as to the outcome of the 
submarine campaign in the recent war. The total loss of merchant 
shipping of the United Kingdom, from the outbreak of the war to 
the end of it, was 9,031,828 gross tons. New construction in that 
period amounted to 4,342,296 gross tons, purchases abroad to 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



25 




Fig. 12. Focus of American, British, French, Dutch, and Japanese interests in southeastern 
Asia. Burma, the Straits Settlements (including Singapore), the Federated Malay States, 
Sarawak, Brunei, and British North Borneo are the principal British possessions. » The Dutch 
own the greater part of Borneo in addition to Java, Sumatra, and other islands near by. French 
interests are concentrated in French Indo-China, and in the corner of the region stand the 
Philippine Islands, an American possession. Japanese interests are both strategic and com- 
mercial and are related chiefly to trade with India, Java, and the Philippines, a trade which 
developed rapidly during the World War. 



530,000 gross tons, and enemy tonnage captured to 716,520, making a 
net loss of 3,443,012 gross tons. In addition more than 14,000 lives 
were lost on ships sunk at sea. 

These losses have been a great strain upon the energy of the British Losses and 
people. To a limited extent they are offset by the gains of Great fhrBrUish 
Britain in the division of the German merchant marine. Of 2,550,000 merchant 

fleet 

tons surrendered to the Allies by Germany, the larger part was given 
to Great Britain. Likewise in the division of the ships sunk at Scapa 
Flow by Admiral von Renter and later salvaged, 70 per cent were 
delivered to the British. As a penalty for the sinking, Germany 
also agreed to deliver to the AUies 275,000 tons of tugs, lighters, 
floating cranes, and dry docks, the greater part of which goes to Great 
Britain. Of the shipping that Germany has agreed to build for the 
Allies (in amount not to exceed 200,000 tons a year for five years), 



26 



The New World 



The basis 
of British 
trade policy 



Conflict of 
American 
and British 
interests in 
Latin 
America 



Britain's 
alliance 
with Japan 



Great Britain is also to receive a share. The predominance of British 
shipping is still as strongly marked as ever, in spite of the large losses 
of the war. 

With a road opened to India and the Far East, colonies planted in 
the Caribbean, islands annexed in the Pacific, ports obtained in 
China; with British capital invested in the new countries of the 
world wherever trade centers had grown up ; with a protecting fleet 
developed ; and with cable and coaling stations to support and con- 
trol her fleet, Great Britain has a special interest in the conditions of 
trade everywhere. As long as special trade privileges are restricted 
to the possessions of a single power, no objection can be made by 
Britain or any other power. Should they be established by force or 
otherwise in one country by the goverment of another, and in dis- 
crimination against Great Britain, they may become a source of 
danger. Herein lies the basis for disputes in which America and 
France may have a vital interest. 

It is in Latin America that the United States comes into sharpest 
conflict with British trade interests. Recently the merchants of the 
United States have built up a large trade with Latin American states ; 
they have purchased many railways and established steamship lines, 
banks, and industries, and have invaded zones of business once ex- 
clusively in British control. America also upholds the Monroe 
Doctrine, especiaUy in relation to the weak states of the West Indies 
and Central America. Should the United States greatly extend 
its political influence into South America also, and should it gain 
through political effort any special trade privileges, there would be 
conflict of one sort or another with the British Empire. 

In 1902 Great Britain made an aUiance with Japan, another sea 
power with an island for a base. It turned out to be a wise aUiance, 
for in the World War it brought Japan into the camp of the Allies. 
When, in 1920, the time had come to renew it, objections were raised 
by Japan on the ground that her subjects did not enjoy equality of 
privilege in British dominions. Against Japan's plea for equaUty 
the most vigorous protests were made by Australia, New Zealand, 
and Canada. If Japanese subjects were let into those countries in 
large numbers and were permitted to acquire every kind of property, 
especially land, then British subjects in India would also insist on 
admission to the dominions, with the result that the white popula- 
tions there would be submerged beneath a mounting wave of color. 

Had Japan won the hoped-for concession from Great Britain, she 
could then have brought pressure to bear upon the United States for 



Problems of Imperial Britain 27 

the freer admission of her subjects and the removal of special restric- 
tions on Japanese settlers in California, which state now contains nearly 
half the Japanese in the United States. In closing their gates to 
Asiatic immigration into the white man's lands of the Pacific, the 
people of the British dominions and of the United States find them- 
selves drawn into a closer understanding, which is the strongest 
present guarantee for the peace of the Pacific. 

The alhance between Japan and Great Britain did not endanger the Effect of 
United States, for provision was made against the use of the alliance on^he'^°'^* 
to force Great Britain into war upon the United States at the wish of united 

States 

Japan. The alliance kept Japan in active and necessary touch with 
western political ideals, but this result is now accomplished by Japanese 
participation in the affairs of the League of Nations. Without the 
alliance or the League, Japan's rapid encroachments upon her neigh- 
bors, as in China, Korea, and eastern Siberia, might well alarm 
Americans for the security of the Philippines. 

Great Britain has incurred a net war debt of more than How Great 
$26,000,000,000, in addition to $9,000,000,000 loaned to her weaker pay her ""^^ 
allies. For a small country this is a colossal figure. The dominions ^"s^ debt 
have incurred their own huge debts, and cannot help except through 
the special channels of trade. It will tax British financial power to 
the utmost to keep the nation solvent. The interest aJone is a 
staggering sum to pay each year. There are three principal ways in 
which it can be met : 

(1) By increasing production through harder and more effective 
work. 

(2) By developing important resources of food and raw materials 
in new colonies where land is cheap and labor abundant, as 
in former German East Africa. 

(3) By capitalizing railroads and extractive industries, like agri- 
culture and grazing, in under-developed non-industrial regions 
Hke South America, the East Indies, Australia, and South Africa. 

The two last-named means imply political activity in every land 
where British capital goes, in order that investments may be safe 
and that they may grow in importance. Unless wise cooperative 
plans are developed for the regulation of investment interests among 
rival powers, the present struggle may be found more keen than the 
trade struggle before the war, because of the impulse of high taxes 
that are the necessary consequence of vast national debts. 



28 



The New World 



The prob- 
lems of the 
British 
Empire 



Need for a 
new orienta- 
tion of 
British im- 
perial pol- 
icy 



(B) The Empire in Relation to Its Parts 

With this general view of the British Empire, we may now tm'n to 
regional conditions that in a measure threaten its existence or hmit 
its contribution to human weKare. Other empires have been great 
in their day, and the Roman Empire, in many respects the greatest of 
all, was for long periods in a state of comparative peace and was 
finally overwhelmed only after centuries of proud history. The 
Mohammedan Empire was at one time the greatest in existence (8th 
century). At the beginning of modern times, the colonial empire of 
Spain was the most remarkable. In a century Spain had pioneered a 
way into the western world, built up a powerful navy, and developed a 
system of colonial government. But all these empires failed, partly 
by reason of their vast extent and the inclusion of aUen peoples in 
large numbers, but partly and chiefly because of the decay of national 
character, or at least its failure to develop in proportion to the growth 
of its responsibilities. When men became corrupt or soft at the same 
time that they ruled subject peoples selfishly, or neglected their own 
internal economic affairs, then each empire collapsed under the strain. 

Seeing their problems in the light of historical experience, the 
British have sought to anticipate the causes of decline and to provide 
against them by the adoption of cooperative plans whereby there is 
achieved a greater degree of local self-government. The collapse 
within a few years of four other empires now makes the faults of the 
British Empire stand out in clearer perspective ; for its past benefi- 
cence was but relative, and its record was bright in part by reason of 
its contrast to the record of the autocratic empires of Germany, Austria, 
Russia, and Turkey. It must be said to the credit of the British 
that they have learned to develop, even in remote and diverse com- 
munities, a capacity for self-government in a manner and to a degree 
never before known in history. It must be admitted also that the 
British have dealt with a greater diversity of peoples and conditions 
than have the other colonizing nations of the modern world. 

While a marked devotion to high pohtical ideals is evident in the 
present attitude of the British government towards its possessions, it 
was not the compelling force of such ideals that was responsible for 
the extension of British power. Pohtical administration was assumed 
only because it was found necessary for the development of trade, and 
with each new development went the necessity for new conquests 
to protect the frontiers of the trade regions into which British mer- 
chants had penetrated. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 29 

In spite of the many differences between them, the parts of the 
British Empire, outside the British Isles, may be grouped into three 
great divisions : 

(1) The five self-governing dominions, — Canada, Australia, South 
Africa, New Zealand, and Newfoundland, — units which are in 
general of the same stock and the same speech as the United 
Kingdom, each with a political consciousness that has led to the 
development of what amounts to separate nationality. 

(2) That part of the empire in which Great Britain governs peoples 
of race and speech different from her own. Some regions, like 
India, are complex countries with a wide range of civilization ; 
others — the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, for instance — are un- 
developed tracts sparsely inhabited by people of a low order of 
social development ; and there are dependencies or protectorates 
in varying stages between these two groups (1 and 2). 

(3) Military posts and caUing stations, like Malta, Aden, and 
Gibraltar. 

THE DOMINIONS 

During the war we had the rare spectacle of devotion to the com- colonial 
mon cause of the empire on the part of each one of the colonies and t^i waV'^ 
dominions, but withal a keen anxiety as to the political changes 
needed thereafter to give the dominions a larger degree of independ- 
ence. The most striking statement on the subject came from General 
Smuts of South Africa, whose address in London on "The British 
Commonwealth of Nations" was a daring exposition of the views 
of the distant subject who desires a larger share in the control of 
his provincial affairs, and who at the same time wishes the "com- 
monwealth of nations" idea to displace the old "imperial" idea 
within the British Empire. 

The natural political drift of a people in a new geographical en- virtual in- 
vironment is toward independence. Rarely can the mother country of^'ihe'^do-* 
long maintain its hold unless it adapts itself to this tendency. In minions 
addition, settlers of diverse views and nationalities become merged 
into a group with common aims and with plastic habits of thought. 
A national spirit is developed that cannot fail to exhibit original and 
independent tendencies. Here we have the essence of the colonial 
problem of every nation that attempts to rule distant peoples of the 
old stock in the interests of home commerce and industry and 
the general safety of the sea routes. Great Britain lost the United 
States, but she has never lost the lesson which the American Revolu- 
tion carried with it, and her five self-governing dominions are now in 



30 



The New World 



Imperial 
unity or 
eventual 
separation 
now in the 
balance 



Special 
problems 
of Ireland, 
Egypt, and 
India 



all practical respects free and independent, except as to foreign policy. 
The sole restriction is that they shall not have independent foreign 
relations. The dominions make their own laws, impose their own 
taxes, and even decide how much they shall contribute for the defense 
of the empire. Finally, the Peace Conference of Paris accorded to 
each of the dominions representation in the Assembly of the League 
of Nations, as if they were wholly independent states. 

It is plain that a choice must soon be made between complete sepa- 
ration and a still closer union on the basis of equality. "Daughter 
am I in my mother's house, but mistress in my own " seemed the ex- 
pression of a liberal doctrine when it was written, but it does not satisfy 
present aspirations. The dominions are no longer content to be with- 
out a share in the direction of imperial policies, in support of which, as 
well as for their own security, they have incurred colossal debts and 
given thousands of their best men on the battlefields of Europe. Since 
1887, the prime ministers of the self-governing colonies have met from 
time to time with the British secretary of state for foreign affairs (and 
in later years with the British premier) to discuss matters of general 
interest. The latest of these imperial conferences was held during 
the World War, and was by far the most important. On 4 May 1917 
it recommended the convocation of a special conference after the war 
to consider the entire question of constitutional relations within the 
empire. 

But the most acute political problems confronting Great Britain 
arise, not from the dominions whose independence is now virtually 
complete, but from those portions of the empire where a fierce na- 
tionalism threatens to end in revolution — Ireland, South Africa, 
India and Egypt. These four have been long-standing sources of 
trouble, and they will continue to vex the statesmen of England for 
many years to come. Each one of these possessions is related to a 
particularly vital interest of the empire. 



IRELAND 



Two op- 
posing 
views of 
Irish in- 
dependence 



We wiU take the case of Ireland first. The Irish complain of long 
centuries of oppression, and no one can deny that unjustifiable and 
oppressive measures are the chief historical source of the present 
trouble. But the world has grown tremendously more complex 
since the Irish question first took shape. In its present form it is 
to Englishmen less a matter of control by the British army or the 
civil officers, than of the security of the British Empire as affected 



Problems of Imperial Britain , 31 

by a change in the pohtical government of Ireland. Irishmen are 
now demanding, not home rule, but complete independence. This ap- 
parently simple political program is opposed by two vital conditions : 

(1) The division within the country itself between industrial 
Ulster and the rest of Ireland, chiefly agricultural. 

(2) The religious bitterness between Protestant England and 
Catholic Ireland, which is half the trouble in the case of Ulster 
also. 

It has been well said that the key to the misfortunes that have Effects of 
overtaken Ireland is the geographical situation of that country, which ^eo^"^p^. 
is near enough to England to enforce connection and yet far enough cai situa- 
away to discourage intimacy. St. George's Channel, which sepa- 
rates Ireland from England, is three times as wide as the Straits of 
Dover. Had it been narrower, Roman power might have been ex- 
tended to Ireland ; and thus there might have been achieved in early 
times a unity of people in the British Isles out of which might have 
grown, if not a permanent union, at least a sympathetic understanding. 
A recent writer, contrasting the apparently insoluble Irish question 
with the progress of imperial policy in Canada and Australia, remarked : 
"The dominions are geographically remote and morally near — the 
Irish are geographically near and morally remote." 

After the fall of Rome in the 5th century, Ireland remained a secluded Differences 
island, and there grew up an indigenous culture, especially marked poSar 
by the rapid development of a distinctive Celtic literature and art. develop- 

TTiATif in 

From Ireland, where Christianity was introduced in the 5 th century, England 
Christian teaching spread to England and to northern Europe. In ^^^^^ 
spite of its cultural progress, however, Ireland kept its tribal system 
of government. In contrast to this system was the more highly 
developed Enghsh government, and out of that fundamental contrast 
and what it stood for in the way of English power in trade and land 
tenure was born much of the trouble that devastated Ireland in the 
bitter centuries that followed. The foci of trade would inevitably be 
also the foci of trouble. It was on the eastern coast that English 
settlements were made, through which flowed such mutual commerce 
as the two peoples had developed, and here, aU through the 12th and 
13th centuries, armed contests took place. 

There was chronic trouble between the Irish chiefs on the one hand 
and the British government on the other, and advantage was taken of 
the difficulties of the time to devastate the lands of the chiefs and to 



32 



The New World 



Oppressive 
measures 
taken in 
the 17th 
centiiry 



plant upon them English 
tenants. Not more than 
one eighth of the soil 
of Ireland finally re- 
mained in native hands. 
Many Irish proprietors 
were executed without 
due process of law. 
Nothing less than the 
destruction of the Irish 
people was contem- 
plated. 

Added to the differ- 
ences between the two 
peoples was the fact 
that the Irish were 
mainly Catholics and as 
such were regarded as 
representatives of au- 
tocracy, for it must be 
remembered that in 
England the Reforma- 

FiG. 13. The distribution of population in Ireland by x* „ ™.^„ nlrkcpl-v p«erk_ 

counties (1911). The shaded counties represent denser popu- ," Wdb ClUbei;y d^s^U- 

lation and are the only ones in which manufacturing is im- ciatcd with the CaUSC 

portant. Note the evenness of distribution elsewhere. The « 1"+" 1 -f 1 

Unionist, National, and Republican areas are represented ac- ^* political ireeclom. 

cording to the returns of the election of 1918. Stronfflv influenced bv 

a religious motive, the people of Ireland regarded law and govern- 
ment as opposed to the religion which they practiced and revered. 
This was the condition in Ireland throughout the 15th, 16th, and 
17th centuries. 

To add to the difficulties of the problem, James I encouraged the 
colonization of Ulster, in the north of Ireland (Fig. 13), by Scottish 
settlers (Presbyterians), and thus a division on religious grounds 
was established on the soil of Ireland itself that has made Ulster a 
symbol throughout the world. Whenever in recent years there has 
been an approach to a solution of the general question, Ulster asserts 
its adherence to England and refuses to accept union with the rest of 
Ireland. To compel it to go seems to Ulster to be denying it the 
freedom that the rest of Ireland seeks. 

Believing that Irish industry competed with that of England 
in English and continental markets and that the naval defense of 



POPULATION DENSITY 


. ^-Vv ■=? 




OF IRISH COUNTIES (I9ll) " 




Figures give dens'ty per , <i 


"^^L/^^W 




s^utyre mi/e ^;V 




U Unionist area J? \ 


N Nat,ona/,st ■• y-^ ^O *" 




R ftepub/ican •> '^%A.,T*y-j^ 
1 / 


^"iP)^^^ 




■4fS 








)^>24/^f^ \ 24 >1 > . ^ 


i 


'^^ *t J ^^■'^^'"*^ ^ » 


' ^^ - \J~^t^*^"^ 


'^-^ 


t\ *-'-, 114 "-,0 


'10 \ 127 ■■. \r^ 


54 


P* S3 '^ -' -- : 


A -j^.r^ 




_ 


^-'^ /--- 100 

r' CON NAUGHT 


.' 109 y i yA 




JO 






S 


^■^^Tec ■, 


^ -f J .~s - .^ 










bliix 






/ /lEI.NS/TE R 1 






/ "'""r ^ 








'^^^p-'"V 138 ; 


93 !, 94: r^ •* / 






cr^ 5KUNST-ER 


' '' "^y 




^ 


i '/^"^v--4 


X"^\4^ 




(,.*vaA-.^— 


9^ \ ^ 


il7^__/^>^ ^-^^ 




^ 


^ 88 I ,36 




52 


Cork 








^^■' y- 


Scale ofmiles 




,1 


<^Wy^ 


■a . .IB M » 4. M 







Problems of Imperial Britain • 33 

the British Isles was solely an English responsibility, England im- Regulation 
posed her conmiercial system upon Ireland. In 1665 and 1680 °he?o1e*° 
Ireland was forbidden to send to England live stock and the products interest of 
of live stock. In 1663, 1670, and 1696, acts were passed excluding 
Ireland from trade with the colonies. The only way in which Irish- 
men could meet these restrictions was by emigration or by rising 
against the British authorities. 

Outbreaks against the British government were resumed after the Irish im- 
conquest of Ireland by Cromwell in 1652 and continued, from one ^dThe^ 
cause or another, down through 1761 and 1771, each difficulty being American 
marked by cruel repressions, continued confiscation of the land, and 
a swelling stream of emigrants. It was to America that most of the 
emigrants went, and during the period of the American Revolution 
the Irish in America gave it the fullest support, happy to fight in a 
distant land and under another flag the forces which they and their 
ancestors had been unable to overcome in the homeland. 

In this fact and in the subsequent large emigration to America 
of Irish people, Catholic in religion, bitterly hostile to England, and 
with a history marked by cruelties of every kind, is to be found the 
reason for the development of strong pro-Irish sentiment in America 
which has led, among others, to such actions as the Congressional 
resolutions (1920) favoring the independence of Ireland and the in- 
sertion, in the reservations to the League of Nations as originally 
discussed in the Senate, of a provision that the adhesion of the 
United States would be conditional upon Irish independence. 

Amidst all the complexities of Ireland's later relations with England Experiment 
there is one episode which stands out in strong relief, and that is the paruament 
development of an Irish Parliament, which tended more and more 
strongly toward independence. The significant date in this move- 
ment was 1782, when the British Parliament at length gave to the 
Irish Parliament practically the full measure of power that the Ameri. 
can colonies had sought before the War of the Revolution. It might 
be thought that this would have marked the end of the Irish ques- 
tion; as a matter of fact the question only entered a more intense 
phase. 

The Irish Parliament and the British Parliament were united under 
the British Crown and were to cooperate for common purposes. 
Instead of cooperating, each sought to increase its authority over 
the other. Irish people talked more and more about the "inde- 
pendence" that they had gained in 1782. Englishmen, on the 
other hand, pointed to the common union of the two countries 



34 



The New World 



A principle 
of settle- 
ment 



Attitude of 
the English 
toward the 
Irish ques- 
tion 



under the Crown and assumed an attitude of autTiority over the 
weaker state. During this period of political trouble, the religious 
differences were never forgotten, and from time to time they led to 
disorders in various parts of Ireland. The end of the experiment 
was marked by the dissolution of the Irish Parliament and the union 
of Great Britain and Ireland (1801). 

The Irish problem will never be settled until Irishmen are given a 
fair chance to manage their own affairs. And yet it is difficult to 
give them that chance under conditions of disorder, such as prevail 
at the present timfi, — disorder whose roots run deep into the soil of 
hatred prepared by past wrongs. It is upon the historical facts that 
the Irish have long dwelt, looking backward to the misdeeds of past 
generations of English rather than forward to the practical business 
of securing such conditional freedom as they can. The whole of 
Irish and English relations is one long sequence of mismanage- 
ment. It was an English scholar who wrote, "Ireland is the one 
spot in the British Commonwealth where anarchy has continuously 
flourished." 

Nor have the Irish people responded to the provisions of the Irish 
land purchase acts of 1903 and 1909, whereby a huge sum was made 
available to redeem for peasant cultivation the estates of the landed 
proprietors. In its later phases the long and complicated history of 
agrarian reform is primarily political rather than geographical. Too 
much attention has been paid to grazing; primitive agricultural 
methods are still in vogue on the small peasant farms. To overcome 
the difficulty of supporting a dense population under these condi- 
tions and in the general absence of industries, the government in the 
past few years has fostered the growth of cooperative societies, only 
to find its work opposed at the most critical moment by the country 
traders, who found that the cooperative movement threatened their 
livelihood as middlemen. The Irish leaders also opposed the devel- 
opment of better economic conditions on the ground that these 
diverted the public mind from Home Rule. 

To Ireland's arguments Englishmen reply by saying that in time 
of war the strongly indented coasts of Ireland might furnish bases 
for hundreds of submarines that could blockade the English coast. 
British leaders argue that if Ireland were given complete independ- 
ence, Scotland and Wales might well follow with similar demands 
for separation. They believe that the empire would fall away ; that 
the industrial power of Great Britain would be broken ; that her naval 
preponderance could no longer be maintained. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 35 

Whatever one may think of these arguments respecting Ireland, Fate of 



pos- 



it cannot be assumed that outlying portions of the Empire, hke South sessions lost 
Africa, India, and Egypt, if lost to British control, would merely 
change flags and hve peacefully on without trouble. If England's 
grip is loosened there, one of two things will happen — independence 
or possession by some other strong power. If the latter, shaU it be 
Japan or Russia or Germany or Turkey ? If the former, will a given 
people have peace or anarchy ? To run a country, there are required 
strong men, experience in government, the organized collection of 
revenue, and a proper scheme of civil administration. These things 
do not spring up fuU-grown in a moment. 

THE SOUTH AFRICAN REALM 

Among more distant possessions of the empire, the question of 
local government in relation to British sovereignty is always colored 
by problems of race and often of religion and land tenure as welb 
In these respects South Africa presents complications of as serious 
import as those encountered in any other British imperial pos- 
session; hence it will serve to iUustrate both the range of British 
interests and the way in which problems at first chiefly of local interest 
may befome critical for the imperial scheme. 

When England first became interested in South Africa as a way EngUshbe- 
station on one of her imperial roads, she found the region in the hands f^^h"^^ ^° 
of the Dutch. In 1806, during the Napoleonic Wars, Great Britain Africa 
captured Cape Colony, and the Congress of Vienna formally recog- 
nized her position there. In 1820 a fairly heavy stream of English 
emigration to South Africa began. The rest of the 19th century was 
filled with a bitter struggle for mastery between the English and the 
Dutch settlers, or Boers, which finally ended in the Boer War (1899- 
1902). 

In her development of the resources of South Africa and in her prob- 
efforts to strengthen her political and military control of its popu- 
lations, England found herself confronted with three prime diffi- 
culties : 

(1) Possession of the unoccupied land had been acquired by people 
of Dutch descent, called Boers. 

(2) The richest regions had long been occupied by native blacks, 
who constituted a dense population fringing the eastern coast. 

(3) The distances that had to be covered were so great and the 
means of transportation so feeble that English control of the 
region could at first be only nominal. 



lems of 
government 



36 



The New World 



Control by 
natives and 
by Boers 
displaced 
by English 
control 



Final 

struggle 
with the 
Boers 



The development of gold and diamond mining in South Africa 
led to a heavy investment of capital in the region and a natural in- 
flux of white labor. Parallel with these developments went the dis- 
placement of both natives and Boers by English immigrants, or — 
what amounted to the same thing — the extension of English political 
control over unwilling peoples. At first Great Britain's success with 
the natives was far greater than with the Boers. She could make 
treaties with the native chiefs estabhshing conditions of trade, and 
by securing the cooperation of men of different race she could manage 
to extend her control over milUons of blacks along the eastern border 
of the territory. It was the Boers who gave her the most trouble. As 
English colonists came in, the Boers moved farther and farther north, 
penetrating at last to Lake Ngami at the northern edge of the Kala- 
hari Desert, whence considerable numbers of them "trekked" still 
farther northward, into the interior of central Africa, cutting across 
the grasslands to the edge of the tropical forest, and westward almost 
to the Atlantic coast in Angola (Portuguese West Africa). 

The journeyings of some of these early Boer colonists occupied years, 
and their settlements were temporary, being maintained only until 
news came of richer prospects ahead. The largest compact body 
of Boers settled permanently in the Transvaal, the country across 
(north of) the Vaal River. Toward the English they maintained 
an attitude of aloofness and independence, and they regarded their 
own country as one in which discriminatory laws could be framed to 
the disadvantage of the foreigner. Naturally the English felt that 
the ensuing contest was not so much for political ownership as for 
equality of commercial opportunity, since the Boer republics frankly 
sought to keep out the British trader. After the Jameson raid (De- 
cember 1895 to January 1896) and other less important episodes, 
the contest between the English and the Boers ended in the Boer War 
of 1899-1902. There were heavy losses on both sides, and altogether 
it was an expensive enterprise for Great Britain. 

The world has seen no more remarkable feat than the one that Eng- 
lishmen and Boers accomplished at the close of the war. Sincerely 
trying to forget the hostility and the bitterness natural to war, the lead- 
ers of both sides adopted a policy of conciliation. The Union of South 
Africa was formed in 1910, consisting of Cape of Good Hope, Natal, 
Orange River Colony, and the Transvaal. General Botha, who had 
been fighting the British less than ten years before, became the first 
premier of the new dominion, with a cabinet composed entirely of Boers. 

Since then, political and economic problems have been squarely 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



37 




Fig. 14. The political divisions and plant regions of South Africa. From The Guide to South 
and East Africa, 1916, map opp. p. 101, supplemented by Bews, The Grasses and (Grasslands of 
South Africa, 1918, and by Bartholomew and Lyde, An Atlas of Economic Geography, 1914, 
PL 39. See also the map and illustrations accompanying Evans, "The Veld: Its Resources 
and Dangers," South African Journal of Science, Vol- 17, 1920, pp. 1-34. 

faced. South Africa has won a larger and larger measure of inde- 
pendence. During the recent war the Union of South Africa played 
a notable part. General Botha invaded German Southwest Africa 
and in the course of a few months conquered the entire region. A 
long campaign ensued in German East Africa, ending with the total 
coUapse of German power. But it was not chiefly of the British 
Empire that the South Africans were thinking. It was the con- 
solidation of a nation that they sought, and German East Africa 
and German Southwest Africa were regarded as a menace to the se- 
curity of the Union rather than of the Empire. Naturally, South 
Africa was opposed to the return of these colonies to Germany, and 
early in February 1921 the Council of the League of Nations ap- 
proved the terms of a mandate whereby German Southwest Africa 
is to be administered by the Union of South Africa. 

South Africa may be a union, but it is by no means a unit. Even 
before the federation (1910), the colonies quarreled with each other 
over customs arrangements, railways, legislation respecting native 
black labor, and immigration from India. The Transvaal govern- 



A 



South 

African 

campaigns 

against the 

German 

colonists 



Separatist 
tendencies 
caused by 
racial ques- 
tions 



38 



The New World 



ment favored the foreign port of Lourenzo Marquez (Portuguese) 
rather than Cape Town and Durban (British). Fearing the effects 
of education and industrialization upon the natives, the Boers wished 
to keep the blacks "in their place"; they disliked the English for 
treating blacks and whites upon a basis of equality. It must be 
admitted that their fear was based upon some significant historical 
facts. The Basutos once annihilated an English army ; they can now 
put thousands of armed and mounted men into the field at a 
moment's notice. On one occasion they welcomed an English crown 
governor with an escort of many thousands of horsemen. 
The disposition of whites by poHtical divisions is as follows : 



White Inhabitants in the Union of South Africa^ 



Political Division 


White Population 


Density per Sq. Mi. 


Cape of Good Hope 

Orange Free State ...... 

Transvaal ........ 

Natal 

Southwest Africa 


619,000 
182,000 
499,000 
122,000 
14.000 


2.1 
3.2 
4.0 
3.5 
.003 




1,436,000 2 





South 
Africa's de- 
sire to re- 
serve her 
lands for 
the whites 



Prob- 
lem of the 
native 



There are four and a half times as many blacks as whites in South 
Africa; the numbers are 7,000,000 and 1,500,000 respectively. The 
whites are increasing the more slowly ; and with the use of col- 
ored labor, the percentage of "poor whites" is increasing. Troubled 
as the whites are by these considerations, their attitude toward Asiatic 
labor (Indian and Malay) may be understood. They do not want 
it, and they care little for the effect upon the British Empire as a 
whole should trouble be created by infringement of Indian rights. 
They point out that few regions are left in the temperate zone for 
the expansion of white populations. The black, on the other hand, 
is acclimated to low, hot countries with a high level of productiveness 
and need not feel cramped if he is kept in them. 

At one time the race problem assumed a most dangerous form. 
This was in 1913, when there was a great miners' strike on the Rand, 
accompanied by disturbances on the lines of transportation from 
Bloemfontein to the sea. The possibility of a general collapse of 

> The density of native population is 3.8 per square mile in Rhodesia, 18.7 in Basuto- 
land, and 9.2 in the Union of South Africa. Data from Statesman s Year-Book. 

2 This total would be increased by 45,000 if we included aU British possessions in South 
Africa. The largest single unit is 37,000 in southern Rhodesia. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 39 

transportation threatened to result in a native uprising. While 
the danger from the natives was temporarily averted, it continues to 
form one of the chief problems in South Africa. 

Parallel with the troubles between blacks and whites run the difS.- Special 
culties due to the presence of Indian laborers, who have migrated raSed^by' 
from India. The Indians were first brought in about fifty years ago to ^^e Indian 
work as indentured laborers on sugar and tea plantations. Thus to the 
already serious problem of the blacks of Natal and Basutoland there 
was added the problem of the Indians, who now number 150,000. For 
the blacks, there was no mother country to raise questions that in- 
volved political interests or the integrity of the British Empire. The 
Asiatics, on the other hand, had the active support of the political 
leaders of India, who could make serious trouble for the empire. To 
settle the question, the Parliament of the Union of South Africa in 
1919 passed the Asiatics Trading and Land Act. The two principal 
provisions of the act are : 

(1) No new trading licenses may be issued to Indians after 1 May 
1919, except in the case of a business which was licensed by an 
Indian before that date. 

(2) After the above-mentioned date, no Indian may acquire fixed 
property in the Transvaal. 

This act has aroused the indignation of Indian subjects throughout 
South Africa, though it involves treatment of the Indians no different 
from what they already have experienced in Basutoland and Bechuana- 
land, where they are under the direct administration of Great Britain, 
or in Rliodesia, where they are subject to the regulations of the British 
South Africa Company. 

From the standpoint of the whites, the problem of the Asiatics in a "white 
South Africa is frankly stated to be -that of a struggle between the 
white and colored races for predominance in Africa, the case being the 
same as that of the blacks, as described above. The Indians bring in a 
very low standard of living and thus displace the European in labor 
and in trade. If the white race in South Africa can absorb a large 
white immigrant population in the next few years, it will be able to 
resist the colored races and occupy the land effectively ; but the more 
abundantly colored labor is brought in, the smaller will be the stream 
of white immigrants. The effect of colored immigration in the large 
cities, particularly Cape Town, is socially and morally deplorable. 
Where Indians have competed with the white in business and industry, 



man s 
country 



40 



The New World 



Indian 
merchants 
displacing 
whites 



Objects 
of the 
present 
govern- 
ment 



they have largely displaced him. The competition of the Indian 
trader presses heavily on the European in the veldt country of north- 
ern Natal, where the principal industries are coal mining, cattle farm- 
ing, and the cultivation of maize. It presses upon him in the Vit- 
watersrand and in the towns of Pietermaritzburg, Dundee, and Lady- 
smith, where some European firms have been rendered bankrupt and 
residence property has depreciated in value in the vicinity of the 
Indian quarter. There is a large Indian population on virtually all 
plantations owned by white men. 

The Union of South Africa, torn by these perplexing problems, 
is divided into a number of political parties in violent opposition to 
each other. It was by a relatively narrow margin that General 
Smuts became premier. He and the party of which he is the leader, 
the South African party, have three main principles as the basis of 
national unity and security : 



The de- 
velopment 
of South 
African 
resources 



(1) The maintenance of South Africa's place in the British Empire 
as opposed to complete independence. 

(2) Fair and hearty cooperation between the various branches 
of the white race, particularly the Boers and the English. 

(3) Concentration of the national energies upon a policy of indus- 
trial development. 

By the election of February 1921, the South African party of Smuts 
commands a working majority in the South African Parliament. The 
success of his moderate policy has yet to be assured, however, for 
opposed to him is the powerful Nationalist party, which stands for 
disunion and a narrow racial policy. 

Under the Union of South Africa the economic development of the 
country has been carried on far more effectively than in the days of 
rivalry and disorder. Comprehensive irrigation schemes have been 
developed that will reclaim much of the desert land of which South 
Africa is in large part composed. Also there have been drilled 
throughout the dry veldt country, where grazing is the principal 
industry, a large number of deep wells which furnish the necessary 
water for stock, thus greatly extending the range of South African 
herds. Geological explorations have been carried forward to the 
point of making known the varied mineral wealth of South Africa, 
which includes gold, diamonds, iron, coal, copper, platinum, man- 
ganese, and building stones. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 41 

Agricultural and industrial development could be greatly developed 
in the eastern and southern coastal strip. In a belt of mountain and 
upland country near the coast, 1000 miles long and at least 15 miles 
wide, there is a rainfall exceeding 40 inches a year. If the run-off 
were regulated, forest growth encouraged, and waterpower developed, 
the region would in time vastly increase its agricultural production. 
It could also expect to become a center of industry in the manufacture 
of the raw materials of tropical East Africa. 

RHODESIA AND THE ADJACENT PROTECTED ZONES 

Lying north of the Union of South Africa is Rhodesia, the im- a possible 
mediate government of which is in the hands of the British South ^^y^ °* 
Africa Company. At the present time the political and commercial 
affairs of Rliodesia are in a state of change. Some of its people would 
like to see established a crown colony government, similar to that 
of Nigeria ; others would prefer to have the colony included within 
the Union of South Africa; some advocate autonomy, wliich would 
place Rhodesia in a position in the imperial family similar to that 
of Newfoundland or New Zealand; and stiU others, chiefly mer- 
chants, wish the continuation of the present regime. 

The difficulties in the way of autonomy or of union with South Costs of 
Africa spring chiefly from the fact that the company which has de- m7nt°to be 
veloped the region has invested a vast amount of money, and were defrayed 
this to become a charge against the people now inhabiting the region, 
it could scarcely be borne by them. Equally difficult is the proposal 
to have the imperial exchequer pay the biU, to the advantage of the 
population of Rliodesia. 

The company is now confronting the very serious criticism that Native 
it is exploiting the. native population, whereas Great Britain has al- "^^*® 
ways prided herself upon her strict adherence to the principle of 
maintaining the rights of the natives in the colonies under her control. 
In Canada and Australia she has done this by special reservations, 
and corresponding attention was given to the same subject in New 
Zealand in 1840, in Fiji in 1874, in Papua in 1888. Moreover, Great 
Britain agreed to the insertion in the League of Nations covenant of 
Article 22, which accepts the principle that the well-being and de- 
velopment of peoples not yet able to stand by themselves shall be a 
trust of civilization. 

It has been otherwise in Rhodesia, where the native is not allowed 
to live securely upon his land, and this in a region where landowner- 
ship is a matter of particular importance because of the settled agri- 



42 



The New World 




Fig. 15. British possessions in Africa, and the Cape-to-Cairo railway. Except for a short 
section southwest of Albertvitle, the railway is completed from Cape Town to Lake Tanganyika. 
The principal unfinished section is in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. British possessions in Africa 
that were held before 1914 are stippled ; those gained as a result of the World War are cross- 
lined. Note that the new name for British East Africa is Kenya Colony ; also that the new 
boundary between that colony and Italian Somaliland is not shown on this map (for this see 
Figure 271). 



Land 

situation 

seriously 

affects the 

native 

farmer 



cultural life of the people. Great Britain knows perfectly well how 
to handle the problem. In Nigeria, for example, all the land is native- 
owned. But in contrast to this happy state of affairs, in southern 
Rhodesia the natives have lost landownership as tribes and as in- 
dividuals. Until the radical concession of the British South Africa 
Company is revoked, the native put in possession of his lands, and 
economic restrictions removed, the relation of natives and whites 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



43 



will furnish a standing menace to the people of South Africa, and may 
be the prelude to a race catastrophe. 

If Bechuanaland, Basutoland, and Swaziland are incorporated 
in the Union of South Africa rather than maintained as a direct 
charge of the imperial government, the native problem will become 
still more complex. It will be more difficult to keep the native 
population within its present confines, seeing that race consciousness 
is developing a tendency to press for a nearer approach to equafity 
of privilege. But as the cost of the white man's living is constantly 
rising, his impulse is to secure himself in a position of relative 
economic advantage. This position he tries to gain by becoming a 
member of the Labor party, which seeks special privilege, or of the 
Nationafist party, which stands for race exclusion. 

THE INDIAN EMPIRE 

For Great Britain, the question of peace or anarchy wears some 
of its gravest aspects in India, where there are rehgious, economic, 
and international problems of the first order. Here are 66,000,000 
Mohammedans who, with their brethren of the Arab world, tlu-eaten 
British hold on southwestern Asia; and were that hold broken at 
one place, it would immediately be relaxed at aU others. Moreover, 
the trade of India is altogether essential to Great Britain's hold on 
genergil Asiatic trade. The British exports to India are greater than 
to any other country except France. Let us look at the historiccd 
relations of this dependency of imperial extent and importance. 

Under the Portuguese, in the early years of the 16th century, there 
was developed a trading and governmental system which first brought 
European wares and pohtical ambitions into the Indian field. Later 
came the East India Company, which was organized at London in 
1600. The Portuguese were easily displaced, and the Dutch were 
driven to concentrate their efforts in the East Indies. The French, 
however, offered a more effective resistance, and a long struggle was 
waged that finally resulted (1757) in victory for the English com- 
pany. During the hundred years that foUowed, the East India 
Company gradually lost its valuable monopolies, and after the Com- 
pany had proved itseK incapable of handhng the great revolt of 1857 
(the Sepoy Rebellion), Parfiament assumed full control of the govern- 
ment of India. 

The problem of England is twofold — to control the 325 milHons 
of India and to develop British trade, and to do both in such a man- 
ner as to keep the peace. For India has always been a difficult coun- 



Extension 
of bound- 
aries has 
increased 
the white 
man's 
problem 



Colonial 
rivalry and 
the es- 
tabUsh- 
ment of 
English 
power 



44 



The Neiv World 



The diffi- 
ctilties of 
govern- 
ment 



India long 
in a state 
of anarchy 



Recent dis- 
orders in 
northern 
India 



Unruly 
border 
peoples 



try to dominate. Alexander the Great reached it in 327 B.C., but 
his empire did not remain. Many later invasions took place across 
the northern frontier : there came Mohammedans, congregated 
chiefly in the northern part; Afghans, who waged an almost 
continual border warfare; and Turks, who sought to extend their 
power into the dense masses of India and of China as well. In 
large measure India has absorbed the invader. With the Brit'sh, 
however, this has not been true; they came for trade, not for 
conquest. 

As in so many of the protected regions of the world, the question 
is one not merely of trade, but of order. Many of the most progres- 
sive and intelligent Indians believe that were Great Britain to leave 
India to her fate, the land would fall into disorder and there would 
be rivers of blood. For when India ruled herself, there was incessant 
warfare between her many local rulers ; each one sought an extension 
of his realm and an increase of power; intrigue, bribery, and war 
followed in logical sequence. Under British rule the country has been 
in the main peaceful. But as in Egypt, there is a nationalist move- 
ment, and its followers regard the British as exploiters who lack real 
sympathy for the native. They wish to see Great Britain driven out 
and native rule restored. 

The Moslem Indian population was more or less disorderly through* 
out the World War. The last serious trouble occurred in April 1919, 
when nearly four hundred natives of Amritsar were killed by General 
Dyer's troops for assembling in a public square. Thereupon Indian 
feeling was greatly inflamed everywhere and the whole national 
movement was much intensified. The Indian National Congress 
Selected the site of Amritsar for its 1919 session and sought to pro- 
mote Indian independence ; but the more moderate Indian repre- 
sentatives had a separate conference at Calcutta and were concerned 
chiefly with reforms in the present government. 

On India's northern frontier, adjacent to the Afghan border, there 
is great difficulty with unsubdued mountain tribes — e.g. Wazirs 
and Mahsuds. The British government has respected the independ- 
ence of the tribes and has protected the area by maintaining garri- 
sons at strategic points. These tribes can put 30,000 armed men 
in the field and, as they are fanatical Moslems, they are easily tempted 
to hostilities through the influence of their religious leaders. In 
May 1919 they invaded northern India, burned villages, cut tele- 
graph lines, and carried out raids against the Indian population. 
Through the summer and autumn of 1919 the British, in the face of 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



45 




Fig. 16. The widespread effects of the caste system of the Hindus may be realized from a 
study of this map. Note the large Mohammedan population of northwestern India. From 
Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol. 26, 1909, PI. 15. 



strong resistance, sent military forces into the mountain region where 
the unruly tribes live, and partly subdued them. 

Disorder in India is a particularly grave matter, since it affects Danger of 
not only the control of the country but also the distribution of food genera/dis- 
and the whole modern system of trade that has become established organiza- 
there. India now has 112,000 square miles of irrigated land and the 
irrigation works require cooperative control and an orderly govern- 
ment. Were the railroads and the irrigation works, the ports, and 
the whole machinery of commercial life to be disorganized, India 
would be ripe for a great disaster. The famines of the past would be 
repeated, millions wou'd be killed by starvation and war, and misery 
and anarchy would spread from India to the adjacent lands. If an 
Indian policy can be developed which will give autonomy to the local 
Indian governments, fair treatment to the natives, and an equitable 



46 



The New World 



Diversities 
of race, re- 
ligion, and 
caste pre- 
vent a 
unified na- 
tive gov- 
ernment 



Effects of a 
complicated 
historical 
and racial 
develop- 
ment 




Jruernattonal Fum service 

Fig. 17. Dekka, near the northwestern frontier of India, where the British have fought 

Afghan and other tribesmen. 

distribution of the profits of business enterprise among natives and 
foreigners, there will follow a better state of affairs than could be 
obtained under the rule of rival princes. 

The contrasts among the peoples of India are very great. The 
differences of caste and race are too extreme to permit any real unity 
of the population for a long time to come. But what is of more pres- 
ent practical interest, the diversities are so great that there is no 
such tiling as general public opinion. Each section of the country, 
each part of a religious sect, each caste, has its OAvn ideas and has no 
respect for those of another. The contrasts and animosities of feel- 
ing could not be more marked if the various groups were separated 
by great distances and hved under quite different conditions. 
"India" is not in their minds when they find fault with British rule; 
they think only of the autonomy of their own district. 

The contrasts between the different races, languages, and reh- 
gions of India have been increased through a long history involving 
many different kinds and degrees of civihzation. Moreover, three 
fourths of the people are agricultural and hve in small villages and 
on farms. In general, the better types live in the cooler regions of 
the north. The hotter the climate, the denser the population and 
the greater the ignorance. Climate and physical environment, as 
well as racial characteristics, have produced a degree of diversity 



Problems of Imperial Britain 47 

almost incomprehensible, so that India is not to 'be thought of as a 
country of common characteristics or as presenting to its leaders and 
rulers a problem of a simple nature. Its 325,000,000 people are com- 
posed of 45 different races speaking 170 languages and divided into 
2400 tribes or castes. They are scattered over an area almost pre- 
cisely half that of Europe. Of this population three fourths are under 
British rule, but only half of one per cent use English effectively. 

Of the total population, 217 millions are Hindus and 60 millions are 
composed of descendants of the original Turanian tribes. The latter 
form the lowest grade of inhabitants in the country. Many of them are 
outcasts doing the lowest and most menial work; others have kept 
their freedom by living in the mountains, in the deserts, in the for- 
ests. All of them hate the Hindus bitterly. 

From long before the Christian era a most to 1000 a.d., the Hindus The Hindu 
came from the north in wave on wave of conquering hordes that, and^tte * 
crossing the high passes of eastern Afghanistan, subdued the land ^*^*® ^y^' 
only after long and bloody struggles. After the conquest of the aborig- 
inal populations, the Hindus fought each other and a state of anarchy 
prevailed. Finally there came the perfection of the caste system 
to disunite the Hindus still further, reduce the warlike class, make 
the people pacifistic, and lay India open to invasion and conquest. 
Of these invasions, the one that produced the greatest visible effect 
ended iii 1206 a.d., when the Moslem hordes poured into India; 
during the next three hundred years the Mohammedan kingdoms were 
formed. With the coming of the British, the rivalries which had 
formed the basis of past anarchy subsided. But even now the number 
of castes, the prejudices of the people, the restraints which their 
religions put upon their treatment of animals, all greatly retard 
the economic development of the country. 

In all India there are some 700 feudatory states, eanh jealous of the Problem of 
others' rights and privileges. They include two fifths of the land of 
India and have a population of about 75,000,000. There are states 
of every size, scattered from one end of the land to the other. The 
largest is Haiderabad, with a population of 13,000,000. Some of the 
states are of ancient origin; others are recent; some were formed 
out of the fragments of the Mogul Empire (1526-1761). When 
the British government took over the management of the country, 
it guaranteed the integrity of existing states and the dignity and 
privileges of the rulers, making treaties with them which have per- 
sisted down to the present time. The rulers are not sovereign, but 
are subordinate to His Majesty the King-Emperor and to his repre- 



the feud- 
atory states 



48 



The New World 



Village or- 
ganization 
the basis of 
self-gov- 
ernment 




Fig. 18. The importance of the monsoon rains is suggested by the denser populations of the 
eastern and western coasts ; and the Ganges valley is marked by a population density greater 
than that found in all but a few other regions in the world. After Bartholomew, Advanced 
Atlas of Physical and Political Geography, 1917, Sheet 65. 

sentative the Viceroy, or Governor-General, of India. Were the 
people warlike, they would present to Great Britain an impossible 
problem of race, religion, and general order. But only 25,000,000 can 
be said to have any military spirit, and these are widely scattered. 

The society of India has its basic feature in the village organiza- 
tion. Through all the long and complicated history of India, varied 
by conquest, by interstate rivalries, by famines, by calamities such as 
plagues of locusts and epidemics of disease that carried off millions, 
the village organization and confederations of village communities 
have been maintained. These confederations have been the most 
durable organization in India, and the improvement of Indian con- 
ditions can be carried on only if attention is paid to the value of the 
village community as the basis of self-government. 

India is fundamentally agricultural ; less than 10 per cent of the 
population is urban, as compared with 78 per cent in England and 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



49 




Fig. 19. The native states and territories are shown in light stipple and the territories perma- 
nently administered by the government of India with diagonal ruling, while British India is left 
white. From Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol. 26, 1909, PI. 20. 



Wales and 48 per cent in Germany. In Bombay, 18 per cent of the 
population is urban, the high percentage being due to the presence 
of cotton mills ; while in Assam, where the country is broken and the 
people lead an unsettled life, only 3 per cent live in cities. India as a 
whole has but thirty cities of more than 100,000, while the United 
States, with one third the population, has sixty-eight cities of more 
than 100,000. Only two of India's cities, Calcutta and Bombay, have 
more than a million people each. The population, completely de- 
pendent on agriculture, is crowded on the flat lands of India, where 
a rainfall of seventy inches is needed to insure crops. As a conse- 
quence, terrible famines ensue when the rains are light. 

So long as India depends upon minor crops, such as form the basis 
of her present food supply, her condition will be slow to improve 
commercially. The more remunerative crops are wheat and cotton, 



50 



The New World 




Fig. 20. Distribution of wheat and rice crops in India. Compare with Figure 18. From Finch 
and Baker, Atlas of American Agriculture, 1917, Figures 25 and 58. 



Recurrent 
famines 
and the 
famine 
service 



Small irri- 
gation 
works or 
tanks 



and these are to a large degree dependent upon artificial irrigation. 
Moreover, increased irrigation would make the people more inde- 
pendent of the uncertain rains. The rains of India are seasonal 
in character — the so-called monsoon rains — and have great varia- 
tions from year to year and from district to district in the same 
year. 

When the rains fail altogether, famine results unless there is arti- 
ficial irrigation. Formerly these famines were accompanied by ter- 
rible loss of life ; but with increase of railway lines and better facili- 
ties for the transportation of food by motor and otherwise, and es- 
pecially by the organization of a "famine service," the loss of life 
is now largely averted. The ensuing poverty is still very great, how- 
ever, on account of the loss of cattle, which strip the grazing grounds 
and migrate from place to place, dying in large numbers and thus 
wiping out the peasant's capital. 

Much has already been done to further irrigation ; but the task is 
only begun. The irrigation service in India includes not only great 
modern engineering works but also an immense system of artificial res- 
ervoirs, the most extensive of their kind in the world. Some of them 
are of great antiquity. They consist of earthen tanks formed by build- 
ing a series of banks around a depression in the ground or across the 
outlet of a small valley. Their extent is from a few square rods to 
several acres. Some of the more modern ones have dams made of 
masonry. When one reservoir is filled with sediment, another is 
constructed above or below it. The floor of the former reservoir 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



51 



S' ^Z" 1 DATA, 30 

::■■! I \ O 

■■;■;/ i X'Delhl ' " • • O 

sjKaracln / "-loBcjiarc's ' ' - -« 

Calputtau Mmdiday 

) Ranqoon 



J.0 







SO to 75 inches 
over 75 B 



Fig. 21. Rainfall and famine areas in India. Rainfall from Imperial Gazetteer of India, Vol. . 
26, 1909, PI. 10. Famine areas from Andree, Geographische Handbmh, 1899, p. 579; id., Geo- 
graphic des Welthandels, Vol. 2, 1913, p. 552 ; supplemented by Digby, The Famine Campaign 
in Southern India, 2 vols., 1878; Merewether, A Tour through the Famine Districts of India, 
1898 ; Scott, The Famine Land, 1904. 

is then converted into cultivated fields. Figure 22 shows the reser- 
voirs in a small portion of the province of Haiderabad ; the minute 
distribution gives an idea of the large number of people of India that 
live in villages and on small holdings of land, and makes one realize 
the full meaning of the statement that three fourths of the people of 
India are agricultural. 

Among the larger works is the Punjab system (at the northwestern The great 
corner of the northern famine district, shown in Figure 21), ^"°^^ 
whereby nearly 2,000,000 acres of land once arid have been placed 
under irrigation, in addition to more than 9,000,000 acres previously 
irrigated in the Punjaib district. This was done by turning river 
water into three great canals that, with their main branches and 
smaller tributaries, have a total length of 3000 miles. The irrigated 
area hes in a region whose average rainfall is from 7 to 25 inches, and 
where agriculture would always be precarious without artificial help. 

The fault which almost all classes of Indians have to find with the Indian 
British government is based upon the cumbersome workings of the ^f British^ 
India Office and the Indian administration in general. The rural admims- 
people, who form three fourths of the population, pay the greater 
part of the revenues in the land tax; yet they are without repre-? 
sentation in the legislative bodies, and have no way of expressing 
their grievances. The revenues are not employed to suit their local 
needs. Great irrigation works and railroads are built and harbors 
are improved, but the lot of the farmer is unchanged. 



52 



The New World 



The delays 
of justice 



The land 
tax a 
heavy 
burden 



The policy of centralization of the work of the India Office has been 
carried to a high state of inefficiency. A mere handful of 3000 British 
administrators are trying to rule 325,000,000 subjects. Those in 
supreme authority are overloaded with work. The officials are criti- 
cally selected, but they are confronted with overpowering difficulties, 
being required to make rulings upon trivial and local affairs, though 
lacking acquaintance in sufficient detail, with the climatic, racial, and 
religious peculiarities of the diversified Indian empire Long delays 
ensue, and it has been recognized in all times that delays in securing 
justice constitute one of the fundamental and justifiable complaints 
of a subject people. These things touch the life of the people in a 
vital way. Their complaints will not be stopped until they have 
local self-government, which in some form should be integrated with 
the general admin stration of India by provinces and as a whole. 

Pressing upon the people of India in a manner to produce great 
distress is the land tax, in addition to which is the water tax in the 
irrigated areas. The land tax keeps the mass of the population in a 
state bordering on slavery. Millions cannot get sufficient food. At 
the end of his year of labor, the farmer finds his crop divided be- 
tween the landlord and the government. He has to go into debt to 
the village shopkeeper, getting credit for food and seed in the ensuing 
year. Since 240,000,000 people in India are connected directly or 
indirectly with agriculture, this means that a large majority of them, 
probably two thirds, are hving in a state of squalor. 




Fig. 22. Small "tanks" containing surface water impounded behind earthen dams and used 
for local irrigation. They occupy 1580 square miles in British India. Reduced section from 
the topographic map of India, scale 1 : 253,440, Sheet 56-0, 1914. 



Problems of Imperial Britain .53 

This does not mean that many Indians are not living under better 
conditions. Thirty millions of them, many of whom are town- 
dwellers, have prospered by the general increase of trade and through 
the benefits of the Indian administration. There are many rich 
bankers and merchants. But the position of the peasant remains 
the same, and it cannot be improved until the land revenue system 
is changed and the heavy land tax reduced. The most serious of 
the social and economic problems of India were not created by the 
British, but the people of India look to their British rulers for a 
solution. Here, as in Ireland, there is an economic problem of great 
magnitude that is constantly involved with political issues. As in 
all times and places, a government remote from the common people 
is blamed for disaster and appealed to for relief. 

Wliat has England done to meet the complaints of her Indian 
subjects ? 

On 20 August 1917, the Secretary of State for India announced There- 
in the House of Commons that the British government was in favor ermnenT' 
of gradual development of self-governing institutions in India. To o^ii^^ia 
this end there was introduced into Parliament the Government of 
India Bill, which was passed in 1919 as the so-caUed Reforms Bill. 
In each of the eight major provinces (excluding Burma) administra- 
tion wiU be divided between the governor, who retains power over 
questions that are "reserved," and the ministers, who deal with 
questions that are to be "transferred" to them. Among the trans- 
ferred subjects are local government, agriculture, industrial develop- 
ment, public health, education, and public works. The governor 
will continue to be appointed by the Viceroy or by the Crown, and 
will be assisted by an Executive Council, of whom one must be an 
Indian. The ministers are chosen from the elected members of the 
Legislative Council. Not more than one fifth of the Legislative 
Council may be officials {i.e. British). Three seats on the Viceroy's 
Executive Council are assigned to Indians. 

This dual form of government has not been applied to the central Financial 
administration, but there has been created a second chamber, the now^iargeiy 
Council of State, and a majority of both assemblies will be elected under in- 
by popular vote. India's financial policy will be largely in her own troi 
control. By this bill the franchise has been extended to more 
than 5,000,000 persons, out of a total of 60,000,000 who might be 
eligible. The franchise was previously exercised by some 33,000 
persons. The bill is avowedly transitional, and itself provides for a 
commission to investigate its results after the expiration of ten years. 



54 The Neiv World 

Brahmins Opinion with respect to the new form of government varies widely. 

iopower"^^ SoniG objection has been raised on the ground that the Brahmins, a 
powerful caste despising all other Indians and constituting but 5 per 
cent of the population, may win fresh political and administrative 
power in addition to the vast social, religious, and official powers 
which they already possess. 



THE EMPIRE AIVD THE MOHAMMEDAN REALM 

Mohamme- We havc viewed India's problems mainly from the political and 
**^utiSi^^* economic standpoints. While the religious aspect is important, its 
force importance springs chiefly from the relation of the whole Moham- 

medan question to the maintenance and security of the road to India. 
We shall first discuss the power and geographical extent of Islam, 
No matter where that reahn might be placed in the world, it would 
interest thinking men. 

Mohammedanism is in substance a political as well as a religious 
matter. Although its adherents aie widely distributed (Fig. 23), 
every Mohammedan every day turns in prayer toward Mecca, his 
Holy City ; only from Mecca can be proclaimed a Jihad, or Holy 
War, to which all Mohammedans must respond; it is the religious 
capital of 250,000,000 people and has been the center of Moham- 
medanism for more than a thousand years. The pilgrimage to Mecca 
di'aws thousands of picked men from every peirt of the Moslem world, 
and thus is practically an annual Pan-Islamic congress where all the 
interests of the Moslem world are discussed. Mohammedanism is 
the most fanatical religion in the world. To the Mohammedan, 
the Christian is "a dog of an infidel." To die for the Prophet is to 
save one's soul. 

The extraordinary fact about Mohanunedanism is its strong hold 
u]X>n its followers. No people once Mohammedan has ever been 
converted to the Christian religion. The power of Islam is per- 
sistent. There is scarcely anything like it in the world, and it is grow- 
ing with terrific speed, not only among the crowded populations of 
the East, but also and chiefly among the millions of Ifiiegroes in cen- 
tral Africa. Brown and black and yellow respond to its teachings. 
On all these races the white man has laid the hand of political control 
and is correspondingly feared or hated. Mohammedanism there- 
fore represents a fanatical religion whose political power will try the 
tact, and it may be the military strength, of the western powers. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



55 




Fig. 23. A study of the map suggests the extent to which colonial government and commerce 
are affected by religious considerations in the East Indies, northern Africa, and the Near East. 
There are many Mohammedan sects, but only the powerful Senussi sect is shown here in its 
chief centers of influence. After Schrader, Atlas de geographic historique, PI. 51 ; Senussi locali- 
ties after Debes, Handatlas, 1913. Area A, in northern India, represents a locality inhabited by 
both Shiite and Sunni Mohammedans; B, in the Balkans, represents Bosnia. 



The heart and center of the Mohammedan realm is on the east- 
ern side of the Red Sea. On the western side of the Red Sea is Egypt? 
sometimes called the "wasp-waist" of the British Empire. Great 
Britain's interest in Mohammedanism is therefore vital. At the 
northern end of the Red Sea is the Suez Canal, on the direct route 
to India from the whole Mediterranean region and from England. 
Of the 325,000,000 people of India 66,000,000 are Mohammedans. 
During the recent war it took 250,000 Anglo-Indian troops to hold in 
control the Mohammedans and the border tribes. For Great Britain, 
Egypt and India and Mesopotamia and the gateway of the Mediter- 
ranean Sea all hang together joined by their common association with 
Great Britain's road to India and by the presence of a Mohammedan 
element. The problems of these regions have long had vital and 
sinister aspects for the men of England. 

With the break-up of both the Turkish and the Russian empires. 
Great Britain's relations to the Mohammedan world and the Near 
East have been altered in many respects. Turkey was always able 
to threaten trouble among the Mohammedan populations of the 
British Empire, not only in the Near East but also in Zanzibar 



The road 
to India 
through 
the Mo- 
hammedan 
realm 



56 The New World 

Turkish and British East Africa, South Africa, and India. Russia, in her 

shin inter- scajch for a warm-watcr outlet, was making desperate efforts to 

estsno reach the head of the Persian Gulf. In 1907 Russia and Great 

a menace to Britain signed an agreement giving the former country political rights, 

Bntain ^^ ^ "sphere of influence," down to the line shown in Figure 230. But 

for that agreement, the probable ambitions of future Russia might 

still be added to the force of the dominant religion in Turkey to keep 

British statesmen uneasy about the safety of their far-flung empire. 

A source of anxiety, however, remains in the activities of Bolshevist 

agents among unstable British subjects, whence may spring results as 

sinister as those that had their origin in the imperialism of the Czar. 

The Religious Confraternities 

Closely related to British imperial interests in Egypt and also to 
the field of French and Itahan colonial expansion in northern Africa, 
are the powerful and influential secret societies, or "confraternities," 
among the Mohammedan populations. This is a general or coUec- 
tive name for the various religious societies of the Mohammedan 
world, of which there are from fifty to one hundred distributed all 
the way from Morocco to Bagdad. Almost every adult male Moslem 
is a member of one of these societies. 

The wide- The Confraternities came into existence in an interesting way. 

spread in- j^iq^ Mohammcd's death, Mohammedanism changed its aspect. 

iluence or . . -. . ^ 

Moham- It reached into the field of law and gave religious authority to 
medan sects ^^^ ^ords and decrees of the lawyers. The rulers on their side 
also sought to control the church and make it an instrument of 
military and pohtical conquest. In addition, the Turks and the 
Arabs developed strong racial and then political animosities. In re- 
action to aU these changes, pious men of strong character founded 
sects or fraternities, withdrew to remote regions, gathered disciples, 
and built monasteries. 
Aims of the Some of these societies were active and reached from one end of 
confratemi- ^Yiq Moslcm world to the other ; others were very obscure and local. 
Some have hved for a long time ; others went out of existence almost 
with the death of the original founder. Some were military in 
spirit ; others were pacifistic. Some of them have become great 
missionary agencies whose chief goal has been the vast interior of 
Africa, where they would be far from the arm of European authority, and 
where there are millions of ignorant, superstitious^ftegroes to convert. 
Some were devoted to poverty, and others amaised great wealth 



Problems of Imperial Britain 57 

with which they could fit out small military expeditions. These 
extended Mohammedan authority and provoked border tribesmen 
to make trouble for European governors about the borders of the 
Sahara as well as in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Libya, French 
Equatorial Africa, and elsewhere. 

The most powerful of the African societies is the Senussi, which The most 
has been in existence for about eighty years and has a quite special reugloui 
character. Its founder claimed to be a direct descendant of the Prophet, sect, the 
He traveled from Mecca all tlirough northern Africa, founding fra- 
ternity centers, and for a time became so powerful that the Sultan 
of Turkey feared loss of prestige as Caliph. He finally settled down 
in Cyrenaica (Fig. 74), where he was almost out of reach of the Turk- 
ish authorities and where he could travel among his own people by 
convenient caravan routes. 

Though at first free from all pohtical influence, the Senussi grad- The Senussi 
ually were drawn into political relations which have affected their ^tionai 
later development. They resisted the coming of the Italians after the polices 
Italo-Turkish War (1911-1912), feeling that with Italian control over 
northern seaports, the lucrative trade in slaves would be suppressed 
or heavily taxed, and ordinary trade diverted. Between 1912 and 
1914 they were supplied with arms, ammunition, and money by the 
Turks, and thus were able to resist successfully the Italian advance 
into the interior of Cyrenaica down to the end of the war. 

With the outbreak of war in August 1914, Turkish agencies became The at- 
active in Libya (Tripoli), and the Italian forces were driven back ^^^^ 
nearer the coast. As the war progressed, the leader of the Senussi Egypt 
became more and more ambitious, and desired to make himself sov- 
ereign of the Moslem worfd. He attacked the Egyptian border from 
three points, the central one being the oasis of Siwa, but the British 
drove him out in February 1917, and so completely defeated him that 
his forces made no eff'ort to return. 

The central stronghold of the Senussi is the oasis of Kufra (Fig. 74), central 
in the heart of the Sahara, more than five hundred miles west of the of^|^^^ 
Nile. It is surrounded by absolute desert, and the caravan routes to senussi 
it are known only to Senussi guides. From this point the influence of 
the leader of the sect extends over most of the Sahara country. 
Occupying a central position, he has a convenient system of commu- 
nications. Tilho has given a fascinating account of his long strug- 
gle during the World War with desert tribesmen under Senussi 
influence in the Tibesti region northeast of Lake Tchad on the 
border of French Equatorial Africa. 



58 



The New World 



THE EGYPTIAN PROTECTORATE 



Egyptian 
rising of 
1919 



Growth of 
an Egyp- 
tian na- 
tionalist 
party and 
violent 
measures 
in 1919 



Egypt can- 
not be al- 
lowed to be- 
come dis- 
orderly 



A deep re- 
ligious 
motive 
underlying 
political 
disorder in 
Egypt 



Ever since the beginning of the World War, poUtical storm signals 
have been flying in the Near East, and it is worth while to see what 
they mean. One of the most recent was the threatened rising in Egypt 
in March 1919. Egypt asks for freedom : can she be trusted with it.^^ 
The British government had its hold on Egypt confirmed by the 
treaty of peace with Tm-key (1920) : why did Egyptians resent this.^ 

The Egyptian leaders, who are intellectually alert, developed a 
strong nationalistic movement at the time England occupied the Nile 
valley (1881). In 1882, the nationalist party asked for "independ- 
ence," and England undertook repressive measures. In 1914, as a 
result of the World War, England abohshed the shadow of Turkish 
overlordship which had existed since 1882, and declared Egypt a 
protectorate of the British Empire. Thereupon the nationalists be- 
came more active than ever, again demanding independence. Failing 
to reach the Peace Conference at Paris, they broke into insurrection. 
From one end of the lower Nile valley to the other, property was 
destroyed and shops were looted ; a number of British soldiers were 
killed. 

The rioting of 1919 was one of many proofs of the limitations of 
British policy in Egypt and of that violence which marks the char- 
acter of the small nationalist groups of Egypt. If the Egyptians 
Uved at the South Pole, the organized world could forget about them 
and let them trouble each other as much as they chose ; but instead 
they hve near one of the great world thoroughfares, the Suez Canal ; 
this is England's road to the East, her direct road to the most im- 
portant of her possessions — India. 

Moreover, whatever the faults of British rule in Egypt, — and they 
are many, — the whole world is interested in these disorders be- 
cause behind them lies a far deeper motive than desire for political 
independence: the hatred of the Moslem Egyptian leaders for 
Christian rule. The outbreaks in Egypt have been supported largely 
by Turkish gold ; the leaders have often been incited or inspired from 
Constantinople. The British assert that the test of capacity for self- 
government by Egyptians is not to be found in the violent spirit and 
phrases of the extreme nationalists, nor in their policy of assassination 
and intimidation. 

The nationalism of Egypt is unworthy of consideration in so far as 
it is the work of agitators of mixed allegiance, like Syrians, Turks, 
and Albanians, and of rehgious fanatics. In so far as it is the honest 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



59 



M:E'J?TT^^RAJ^JErjJV S^A ^ 



^Alexandri 



expression of the Egyptian people, it 
is a matter of serious import. It is 
futile to point to the benefits of British 
occupation, for in all lands and times 
the benefits of ahen rule have been 
considered incapable of balancing its 
disadvantages. It is axiomatic that a 
second-rate government under native 
control is better than a first-rate gov- 
ernment under foreign control. 

While nationalist sentiment has made 
a deep and wide penetration, of which 
account should be taken, it must be 
realized that the alternative to British 
occupation is the return of the country 
to the mixed people, chiefly Moslems, 
who constitute the leaders of the 
nationalist movement. It would not 
mean turning the country over to the 
Copts, or true Egyptians, who form 
the bulk of the population; it would 
bring Egyptian control of the restless 
Mgro populations of the Sudan and 
would reenforce intolerant Moham- 
medanism throughout the Arab world. 

The trouble in Egypt can be under- 
stood only if we know the way in which 
the British came to control the country- 
The Turks were the nominal rulers, 
having conquered the country in 1517, 
when — as now 
disorganized. During the Napoleonic "^"^^ *^® cataracts of the NUe. 
Wars there was military occupation by both the British and the 
French. After the withdrawal of the British there followed a fierce 
war of factions ending in the complete victory of Mehemet Ali, who 
was practically independent ruler of Egypt till his abdication in 1848. 
Although Mehemet Ali continued to acknowledge the nominal suze- 
rainty of the Sultan, he succeeded in having the pashalik made heredi- 
tary in his family and his fourth successor, Ismail, was called Khedive. 
Both British and French commercial interests in Egypt increased, 
especially after the completion of the Suez Canal in 1869 by a French 




Omdurmanc 

lOOM 



, , Fig. 24. Map of Egypt showing the 

It was WeaK. and principal towns, the bordering deserts, 



Universal 
dislike for 
alien nile 
a deep- 
seated 
motive 



The alter- 
native to 
British 
control 



Beginnings 
of British 
control 



60 



The New World 




I 







FiQ. 25. 



Entrance to the Suez Canal at Port Said. This narrow ribbon of water is vital to 
the integrity of the British commercial and political empire. 



French and 
British 
Dual 
Control 



company. In 1875, needing money, the Kliedive sold his shares 
of the Suez Canal Company to the British, who since then have 
watched every move in that part of the world. Would America, 
or France, or Italy not take the same interest in a disorderly country 
bordering its most vital waterway ? 

Since the greater part of the huge debt which the successive rulers 
of Eg>^pt had accmnulated in the 19th century was borrowed from 
the British and the French, those two powers estabhshed a con- 
dominium, known as the Dual Control (1876-1883). The Egyptian 
leaders bitterly resented the interference of the foreigners ; but only 
after they had accepted foreign money did they raise the cry of "Egypt 
for the Egyptians" and seek to organize a general revolution among 
the people, who had not shared in the original loans now^ squandered 
by leaders seeking their support against the foreigner. France having 
declined to use military force, the British took the field and crushed 
a rebellion engineered by Arabi Pasha, an army officer. To main- 
tain order Great Britain kept in Egypt an army of occupation and 
named herself "adviser" to the new Eg>^ptian government. 
The Mahdi Directly thereafter trouble arose in the Sudan, where the Mahdi, 
in the Sudan who had proclaimed himsclf as the "deliverer" of his people, appealed 
to the fanaticism of his followers (1881). defeated the Egyptian troops, 
massacred General Gordon and 11,000 men at Khartum (1885), and 
for about twelve years held the region in his grasp. Finally, in 1898 
General Kitchener completely annihilated the armies of the Mahdi at 
the battle of Omdurman. As a war measure the Sudan, as well as 
Egypt, was declared annexed to the British Empire in 1914, with the 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



61 



status of a " protected state . ' ' Moreover, the treaty of Sevres between 
Turkey and the AUied powers (1920) recognizes the British protectorate 
in Egypt, and Turkey renounces the tribute formerly levied on Egypt. 

But a treaty which is not signed by the representatives of the The pro- 
people whom the treaty affects does not in itself settle disorder or kill Se^E^p- 
political ambition. The Egyptian nationalist program ca'ls for noth- p^ °a- 
ing less than independence from British control, neutrality of the Suez party 
Canal, the recession of the Sudan to Egypt (it was never under effec- 
tive Egyptian control), and a parliamentary form of government. 
Egypt protested that she would keep on struggling to be free as she 
understands freedom; the British government renewed its deter- 
mination never to relinquish its hold. 

The resulting disorders forced Great Britain to attempt a wholly 
new orientation of her Egyptian policy through the Milner mission of 
1920. After a conference between British and Egyptian representa- 
tives, a tentative agreement was drawn up, promising self-govern- 
ment in the immediate future, with moderate British control and 
special reserved rights in relation to the Suez Canal. While Egypt 
would secure "independence," Great Britain would reserve the fol- 
lowing rights : 

(1) To guarantee Egypt from outside aggression and to have 
access to Egyptian territory in case of 
war. 

(2) To maintain a garrison in the Suez Canal 
Zone. 

(3) To control the foreign policy of Egypt and 
to represent Egypt in countries where no 
Egyptian representatives are appointed. 

Great Britain would also agree to abolish the 
capitulations which granted special privileges to 
foreigners, and to have no more " advisers " in 
the different government departments. The ex- 
pected adoption of this preliminary agreement 
would alter the British protectorate declared in 
1914 and recognized by the treaties of Ver- 
sailles, St. Germain, and Sevres. 

The population of Egypt now numbers „ . , .. .u 

rw^i J^jr- xi r ^^„ Nile River, including the 

13,000,000. The people are mostly tarmers broad irrigated expanse of 
living on the delta and on narrow strips of fertile ^^ju. D^;^J-m 
land on either side of the life-givmg Nile. There rEaui^te, i9i4. 




Fig. 26. 
irrigated 



The ribbons of 
land along the 



62 



The New World 



is a well-educated and wealthy class in the towns eager to secure 
political control, though a hniited number see and acknowledge the 
benefits of British supervision and work with British officials in 



maintaining order. 



The land 
and the 
people 



Three 
types of 
distribu- 
tion 



The Nuba 
tribes as an 
example of 
colonial 
difficulties 



THE ANGLO-EGYPTIAN SUDAN 

South of Upper Egypt there is a vast extent of country known 
as the Anglo-Eg> ptian Sudan, extending from Wadi Haifa to Uganda 
in the Victoria Nyanza region. It was formerly a source of great 
difficulty to the British administration of Egypt. Unruly tribes 
inliabit its semi-arid western sections, and their fanatical religion 
(Mohammedanism) has led them to oppose bitterly the authority 
of Christian rulers. It was in 1898 at Omdurman, opposite KJiartum, 
that Kitchener defeated the Mahdi, or "Deliverer" (page 60), and 
restored order. The climax to the events since that time was reached 
in July 1919, when the Golden Sword of the Mahdi was surrendered 
to the Imperial Sovereign of the British Empire. 

The country li'es partly in the basin of the Nile and partly in the 
interior-basin drainage of the Saliara. The portion lying in tlie east 
and south is fertile and has great possibihties for agriculture and cattle 
breeding, while the northern and western portions are arid or semi- 
arid. 

Negroes and Arabs comprise the bulk of the population. They fall 
into the following groups : 

(1) Cattle-owning nomads who occupy the watered and more 
luxuriant country toward the south. In the region of the Nile 
the country is thickly settled. 

(2) Sedentary peoples of mixed type (as in central Kordofan) ; these 
Uve in villages of a dozen or several score huts, the size of 
each viUage depending upon the quantity of ground that can 
be conveniently cultivated and upon the supply of water. 

(3) Camel-owners living chiefly in the northern desert districts; 
these own also large herds of cattle, sheep, and goats, and culti- 
vate the soil. 

As an example of the sedentary type we may take the case of the 
Nuba tribes of Kordofan, since they illustrate also the difficulties that 
confront British officials in these remote sections of the world. The 
Nuba tribesmen occupy the Nuba Hills in central Kordofan. Each 
community is restricted to a given hilly district whose boundaries 
are naturally defined. Cultivation is limited to the terraced slopes 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



63 




Fig. 27. Six hundred miles in a straight line south of the Nile mouths the Anglo-Egyptian 
Sudan begins, to extend nearly fifteen hundred miles farther south. Much of it is desert. Part 
of its population is difficult to manage. Its control is one of the many difficult tasks which 
the British have undertaken in the field of colonial government. New boundary (between 
Wadai and Darfur) in the area of the dotted rectangle, left center, from L'Afrique Franqaise, 
February 1920. The boundary between Egypt (British) and Libya (Itahan) is still indeter- 
minate. So far as it has been defined in preliminary agreements it is shown in Figure 74. 



64 



The Neiv World 



Aridity of 
the western 
desert 
portions 
has led to 
water 
storage in 
trees 



The better 
land and 
denser 
popula- 
tions bor- 
der the Nile 







of the hills. Some grain is 
produced and vegetables, cot- 
ton, and tobacco also are 
grown. The Nuba tribesmen 
own considerable herds of 
cattle, sheep, and goats. They 
have long defended their hills 
by stone walls built across the 
valleys and by a system of 
water, grain, and even cattle 
storage in the caves found in 
the more inaccessible heights. 
One of the most remark- 
able of the features of the 
region is illustrated in Dar 
Haniar, southeastern Kor- 
dofan, where the natives are 
dependent for most of the 
year on the supply of water 
stored in the enlarged natural 
cavities of the tebeldi trees in 
sufficient quantities to last 
through an entire dry season. 
The diameter of the trees 
varies from 10 to 15 feet, and the interior reservoir is often 20 feet 
high. The trees form valuable property and are let or sold with the 
adjacent land. It is estimated that there are at least 200,000 of them 
in the district. When the local water supply becomes inadequate, 
certain families break away and form a new village. 

The best agricultural land of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan is in the 
Kordofan region, but the crops are limited by the amount of rain- 
fall, except locally along the river, where river floods or irrigation 
from the Nile make possible a larger extent of cultivated land and a 
denser population. Swarms of migratory locusts occasionally visit 
the district and devour the crops. Cotton and cereals are grown, 
and a variety of grains. Cattle form the principal basis of the ex- 
port trade to Egypt. Ivory is imported from southern districts, and 
ostriches are kept in some of the villages. Gum arabic forms a prin- 
cipal article of commerce. 

Protection from the various Arab tribes and sub-tribes of the 
plains round about has been secured by payment of a regular tribute 



FiQ. 28. The difficulties in the way of management 
of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan may be judged by 
studying this map of comparative distances. A 
single main railway line runs from Wadi Haifa 
southward through Khartum to El Obeid, 230 miles 
southwest of Khartum. This line has but one im- 
portant branch, to the Red Sea coast near Suakin. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



Q5 



of grain and slaves. Among themselves, the more powerful hill com- 
munities of the Nuba tribes have always made war upon the weaker 
communities, an intertribal conflict stimulated by the protection 
from Arab invasion which the English government gave to the hill 
communities. In 1908 a military expedition was sent into the coun- 
try to storm the principal strongholds and bring the natives to a 
state of submission, and again in 1909, 1910, and 1911 successive 
expeditions had to be sent to maintain order. 

Darfur, west of Kordofan province, remained semi-independent 
until 1916, when, following the rebellion of the sultan Ali Dinar, the 
country was conquered and later incorporated as the fifteenth prov- 
ince of the Sudan. This measure led to the settlement of the long- 
postponed frontier question of Wadai and Darfur. 

Great Britain and France have now agreed upon the boundary 
line shown in Figure 27. It is a settlement of importance to the 
peace of the Sudan by reason of the fact that until it was made 
neither the British nor the French could effectively pacify the more 
remote peoples on their common borders, the British operating from 
Khartum and the French from the forts along the Shari River, the 
principal feeder of Lake Tchad. 



Military 
expeditions 
against the 
Nuba hill- 
men 



Pacification 
of the re- 
gion on the 
western 
frontier 



BRITISH INTERESTS IN ARABIA 



Interior Desert Tribes and Coastal Settlements 

British power in Arabia has been exercised hitherto chiefly on the 
borders of the country and in places accessible to naval vessels. With 
the advance of the Turkish armies on Egypt by way of Syria and 
Palestine in 1916, British forces had to win and hold the allegiance 
of the Arabs. The 
enormous difficulties of 
this task were over- 
come with marked suc- 
cess. 

To understand the 
political problems of 
Arabia, let us look first 
at the physical geog- 
raphy. Arabia is a 
huge desert peninsula. 

Placed over the United Fig. 29. Anatolia and Arabia in terms of American locationa. 




Physical 
geography 
of Arabia as 
an isolating 
factor 



66 



The Netv World 



The fanat- 
ical and 
intolerant 
character 
of the 
desert 
tribes 



The Nejd 
the heart of 
Arabia; 
its people 
never con- 
quered 



States, it would extend from San Diego, California, to Chicago, and 
from Canada to Mexico (Fig. 29). Every part of this vast region is 
more or less a unit in itself. It is bordered on at least one side by a 
broad and nearly impassable desert. The isolation of the country is 
stiU further marked by the absence of good harbors and improved 
roads. 

The country is broken into strongly marked physiographic units, 
and its people have always been divided into primitive organizations, 
in wliich the tribal idea is paramount. The tribes are all fiercely 
fanatical and have excluded the intruder to a remarkable degree, being 
helped in this respect by the inaccessibihty of the country. Even 
the Turkish officials and the Turkish tribes have been kept out. 
Though the desert interior is sufficiently high to make the climate 
possible for white men, no white men — not even explorers — have 
penetrated the innermost districts until recent times. The nomadic 
tribes five within a limited space, and the persistent feuds, especially 
between the northern and southern tribes, have intensified their iso- 
lation. This is the more remarkable when we consider that the gen- 
eral mode of life and the language of the whole nomadic group are 
the same. 

The population groups lying in the heart of Arabia are very 
strikingly located. They occur at oases scattered along the valley 
floors of a drainage system associated with a belt of highland 
known as the Djebel Tuwaik (Fig. 30). This highland — the back- 
bone of central Arabia — is in the form of a long ridge extending 
roughly north and south for a distance of nearly 400 miles, with an 
average breadth of 20 miles. Its western border is a relatively steep 
and regular scarp 400 to 600 feet high. Its eastern slope descends 
by broad steps to the desert wastes that flank it on this side. On 
the south, the north, and the west lie other sandy desert tracts that 
form a great moat about the central uplift, which, far removed from 
the coast and from other desert settlements, having small resources, 
inhabited by scattered groups of limited size, and with a people sin- 
gularly hostile and fanatical in their attitude toward the stranger, 
is more isolated than if it were a remote oceanic isle. Southeast of the 
highland region is a broad tract called the Empty Quarter, which 
has never been traversed by a European. 

The tribes of the highland region of the Nejd have never been 
brought under subjection by foreign powers in modern times. Some 
of the towns are of considerable size. Riyadh has a population of 
12,000 to 15,000. The inhabitants of this district form the Wahabi 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



67 



group of Arabs, who 
live under Ibn Saud as 
ruler. The latter has 
maintained a rather 
high state of military 
efficiency and religious 
ardor, and by favoring 
the development of the 
principal towns and vil- 
lages is able to preserve 
the integrity of his 
desert empire. 

It is an interesting 
fact that the traders 
of Yemen and Koweit 
send part of their wares 
through this belt of 
oases in the heart of 
Arabia. Hither comes 
coffee from the Yemen 
in exchange for the tea, 
sugar, and other goods 
of the Persian Gulf 
coast. 

The Mohamme- 
danism of these desert 



tribes is much diluted. Fig. so. The heart of the Arabian desert and home of the 
TVioT>o iQ o rrT.oo+ Aror-Itit-ir independent Wahabis. After Philby, Geographical Journal, 

1 nere is a great variety ^^^^.^j^ ^g^o. 

of religious tendencies, 

expressed in various sects, and there are even primitive pagan and 

semi-pagan forms involving the worship of rocks and mountains. 

Arabia has a northern border of watered country, often called the The Fer- 
Fertile Crescent, where the nomadic Arab has become a sedentary ^g^t^^^nd 
tiller of the soil. Mesopotamia and Syria, like the Hedjaz, Yemen, the divi- 
and Oman, are settled by branches of the Arab people. The govern- Arabia 
ment of the outer coastal states, the commerce, and the customs of 
the people as well, are quite different from those of the inner desert 
tribes. In many places the latter are peaceful enough ; in others 
they periodically raid the rich valleys of the fertile border, or they 
take to piracy, as on the shores of the Persian Gulf. 

Owing to the lawlessness of its people and their disorganized po- 




68 



The New World 



Foreign 
control of 
Arabian 
gateways 



British 
control of 
the Tru- 
cial Coast, 
or Pirate 
Coast 



Opposi- 
tion to a 
great 
Arab 

confedera- 
tion 



Difficulties 
of control of 
the Arab 
world from 
desert 
Arabia 



litical condition, it has been the fate of Arabia to have its borders 
invaded by foreign interests. Non-Arab powers have controlled all 
the water approaches — Great Britain on the south and east and 
formerly Turkey on the west. 

Al Hasa is the name given to the Persian GuK border of Arabia, 
and it has long been famous as the home of pirates or slave traders 
and of evil-minded merchants who thrive on the sale of guns to unruly 
border peoples. This whole region was once described as the Pirate 
Coast, and British control over it has its foundation in an attempt 
to put down piracy, which throve on British commerce. 

The pirates occupied the coast of the Katar peninsula at the strait 
of Hormuz, northwestward to the head of the gulf (Fig. 230). Early 
in the 19th century the British began to police the guK, and from 1805 
to 1821 they had frequent naval encounters with the pirates. Between 
1835 and 1856 the British made many treaties with the Arab chiefs to 
maintain the peace of the gulf, regulate or abolish the slave traffic, 
and end piracy. As a result there was formed among the six princi- 
pal Arab tribes of the region a so-caUed Trucial League. The chiefs 
of these tribes, known as Trucial Chiefs, deal with the British 
resident, or political officer, at Bushire on the Persian coast in all 
matters in dispute between themselves, the Turks, the Persians, and 
the British. 

Recently there has grown up, chiefly as a result of the newly-created 
Kingdom of the Hedjaz, a movement to secure Arab unity. The 
political form would be a confederation of Arab states extending 
from Mesopotamia to Egypt and from Syria to the Red Sea, including 
the whole Arabian peninsula. In fact, the religious or learned doc- 
tors of Mecca have already (1916) proclaimed the Sherif Hussein, 
of Mecca, King of the Arab Nation. But the great powers have 
never recognized this action; their interests, no less than the weak- 
ness of the Arabs themselves, wiU prevent real confederation. 

Also opposed to the desired Arab union is the physical geography 
of the Arabian peninsula. The detached tribal states are widely 
separated on the margin of the great Arabian desert. It is nearly 
a thousand miles from Damascus to Mecca. W^iile the Hedjaz is 
the strongest state, with a population of several hundred thousand, 
its military power is feeble and its pohtical experience small. Nor 
do all the Arab states welcome control by the King of the Hedjaz, 
who rules his tribes like a patriarch. Added to the opposition of the 
chieftains of the inner desert tribes is that of the sheikhs of Asir and 
Yemen on the coast, farther south. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



69 




International Film Service 
Fig. 31. General view of Jiddah, an Arab town, chief port of the Kingdom of the Hedjaz. 

Even before the recent war, the Arab half of the Turkish Empire 
was interested in the founding of a separate Arab empire. Among 
the Arabs there has never been any real interest in the famous Pan- 
Turanian movement of the Turks (page 435). Here we have a very 
interesting fact : there was a division of the Ottoman Empire along 
lines of nationalism rather than religion. 

The local differences of culture and history likewise oppose confed- sectional 
eration. Syria and Arabia have unlike customs, traditions, and habits. "^*^'®^ 
Damascus has an age-old ambition herself to become the head of an 
independent Arab kingdom. 

While the movement for Arab independence made rapid headway struggle be- 
during the World War, it has now taken on very artificial forms. As Jnterror^^ 
soon as the war was over, the traditional disputes of the Arabs were t^J^es and 
revived. They ended in an armed conflict between Ibn Saud, leader the border 
of the Wahabis of the Nejd, and King Hussein of the Hedjaz. The 
former represents the most extreme elements of Mohammedanism; 
the latter stands for a more reasonable and orthodox view of his 
religion. The quarrel grew out of a question of boundaries, but it 
rests in large part also upon deep-seated religious differences that 
illustrate the difficulties of Arab unity, whether we consider Arabia 
itself or northern Africa, or the Sudan, or Syria and Mesopotamia, 
the other principal territorial divisions of the Arab realm. 

If France and Great Britain have their way, the Arab state will 
not be formed of the parts which the Arabs have claimed, nor even 



70 



TJie New World 



Protection 
of foreign 
interests 



Hedjaz 
and the 
annual pil- 
grimages 



Oman and 
the illegal 
trade in 
firearms 



of Syria combined with Palestine or Mesopotamia. At most it would 
consist of interior territory southeast of coastal Syria, and it is not 
expected that the French will permit it to include the railroad and 
cities east of the Sykes-Picot hne, — Homs, Damascus, Hama, and 
Aleppo. (See Figure 209 for the Anglo-French agreement of 23 
December 1920.) 

The border regions of Arabia will stay in the hands of the European 
powers as long as these powers remain strong. Only by becoming 
orderly and self-governing can the Arab tribes expect at last to be 
measurably free from foreign control, because disorder would threaten 
not only the trade and hves of foreigners ; it would threaten also 
England's road to India, besides stirring up trouble in Egypt and 
among the Mohammedan peoples of India itself. 

Because of its relation to the Pan- Arab movement, the Hedjaz 
will continue to be important in international affairs in spite of its 
small size. It is only about 700 miles long and 150 miles wide, and 
hes between the highlands of the plateau of Arabia and the Red Sea 
coast. The name "Hedjaz" means barrier, which refers to the wall 
of high mountains on the edge of the tableland. The largest city 
in the Hedjaz is Mecca, with a population of 80,000, and next to it 
is Medina, with 40,000. The principal traffic is related to the 
pilgrimages made by many devout Mohammedans from all parts of 
the Moslem world. From 80,000 to 100,000 people annually visit the 
holy cities of Mecca and Medina. Most of them come by sea, but 
many come by caravan and, more recently, by rail as far as Medina. 
Only Mohammedans may enter either city. 

Of special interest in a study of Arabia is the principality of Oman. 
The eastern Oman is one of the most advanced districts of Arabia. 
The population of the entire province is estimated at 500,000. First in 
importance is the town of Maskat, with a population of 10,000 and 
a fine harbor, the seat of extensive trade with India and East Africa. 

One of the long-standing difficulties at Oman has been the illicit 
trade in firearms. In 1912 the British compelled the Sultan to pro- 
mulgate a law prohibiting this trade; but French vessels, down to 
the time of the Hague arbitral decision of 1905, had entire freedom 
of commerce in the waters of Oman and could not be searched by 
British gunboats. It is probable that Great Britain will assume a 
protectorate over the region. Everywhere else in the vicinity she has 
increased her power, in line with her policy to control the approaches 
to the route to India. 

Since 1885 the various sultans or emirs of the small Arab states 



Problems of Imperial Britain 71 

along the southern coast of Arabia have virtually recognized British Extent of 

protection. The British have also annexed the Kuria Muria Islands s^^e^e of** 

and assumed a protectorate over Bahrein Island in the Persian Gulf infiueiice 

(Fig. 230). A treaty concluded with Turkey in 1909 recognized as a "^ 
British sphere all of Arabia south of a line drawn between Yemen 
and Aden and extending northeastward to the Katar peninsula, on 
the Persian Gulf. 

The two border provinces of Yemen and Asir remain to be con- xhegeog- 

sidered. Yemen is the small province at the southwestern corner raphyof 

-*■ Yemen 

of the Arabian peninsula. The strip near the coast is barren coun- 
try with a few oases. Toward the east, at the edge of the tableland 
with local mountains exceeding 10,000 feet in height, there is greater 
rainfall and high production. The people are mostly town dwellers 
and fairly industriou§. It is believed that the population numbers 
at least 1,000,000, but no census has ever been made. Europeans 
in the region number less than 1 per cent of the total population. 
The largest city is Sanaa on the edge of the plateau, with a popu- 
lation of 25,000 ; Hodeidah is the principal port. Paying little heed 
to Turkish overlordship, Yemen was a virtually independent country 
up to 1914 and will probably remain so, provided it enters no alhance 
that threatens the welfare of the great powers. 

In length the province of Asir (Fig. 30) is about 230 miles, in Theun- 
width about 150 miles. Like the Hediaz, it has for eastern bound- ^^'^ ^°"°- 

'' . try of Asir 

ary a rugged mountain belt, with well- watered and fertile vaUey floors 
that produce dates and coffee known for their quality throughout 
the world. Shells, skins, and salt also are exported. There are no 
navigable waterways. All inland communication is by caravan. 
Asir has unexplored regions inhabited by warlike tribes. Ghizin 
is the principal port. In 1912 the ruling sheik declared his country 
autonomous. In 1914 Turkey sent warships to the coast, but the 
World War prevented further military measures. 

With a mandatary for Palestine and Mesopotamia, Great Britain British 
has almost encircled the Arabs (the French remain in Syria), and penetra- 
need fear no immediate difficulties in protecting her sea route from the Arab 
Suez Canal to India unless there should come about a general union ^'^^ 
of Mohammedan peoples. 

There is a particular spot near the border of Arabia that deserves prgnch and 
notice because of its critical relation to the Aden and Red Sea out- British in- 

terests in 

let on the British road to India, at the Strait of Bab el Mandeb. conflict at 
This is the port of Sheikh Said, which the French have claimed ^g^J^'^gi* 
for more than half a century. It lies on the eastern shore and Mandeb 



72 



The New World 



iX 



A British 
protecto- 
rate on the 
southern 
coast of 
Arabia 



directly opposite the British-owned island of Perim in the strait itself. 
It is between Perim and Sheikh Said (Fig. 271) that ships take their 
course, and if the place were fortified it would menace the Indian and 
eastern Asiatic conunerce that passes this way. The British look 
longingly at it, for with this and Sokotra Island — which they al- 
ready own — in their hands, every part of the Indian route would be 
amply protected. The small French colony of Somaliland exists 
near by, but it is so completely overshadowed by British Somahland 
and the British Aden colony that it can never become a menace to 
legitimate British interests, either commercial or naval. 

East of the port of Aden is an undefined area on the Gulf of Aden 
which is a British protectorate known as the Makalla Sultanate. 
The region exports raw tobacco, skins, coffee, honey, and shells, and 
has a total annual trade of about $2,000,000, nearly equally divided 
between exports and imports. 



British 
interests 
and prob- 
lems 



MESOPOTAMIA 

In Mesopotamia Great Britain confronts two matters of special 
political concern to her, in addition to the general problem of responsi- 
bility toward the native Arabs : 

(1) The country flanks Great Britain's land route to India. 

(2) In southeastern Mesopotamia Great Britain has built great oil 
refineries and docks for handling the rich petroleum yield of 
regions near by, both in Mesopotamia and in southwestern 
Persia. 

Great Britain's sense of responsibility to the native is not unmixed 
with other motives ; for Mesopotamia, as a part of it (Irak) was in 
ancient times, might become part of a general Arab confederation 
and would then be lost to Great Britain. A British company 
controls transportation on the Tigris-Euphrates river systems, and 
British capital has been invested in the railroad from Basra northward 
(now extended almost to Mosul as part of the Bagdad system). 
British surveys of the irrigation possibilities of Mesopotamia have 
shown the enormously productive capacity of the soil when properly 
watered. Cotton, tobacco, silk, and other subtropical products could 
be grown on a huge scale and might give the region extraordinary com- 
mercial importance. The possible value of these products to industrial 
England is almost incalculable. Originally interested in the region 
chiefly because of the pirates that infested the Persian Gulf and preyed 
upon British shipping, England established poHtical residencies and 



Problems of Imperial Britain 



73 



MESOPOTAMIA 

Settled Arabs 
(PKojECTED)^ Railroads 



-^ Scale of miles 
I i_i I 1 I 1 1 




Fig. 32. Drainage, population, and boundaries of Mesopotamia. After Map of Eastern Tur- 
key in Asia, Syria, and Western Persia (Ethnographical), scale 1:2,000,000, British General 
Staff, No. 2901, 1915. Lake and swamp areas in the Euphrates valley are shown by diagonal 
ruhng. For boundary with Syria see Figure 209. 



trading posts about the shores, and extended her commercial and 
poHtical penetration until she is today in secure hold of the chief re- 
sources, which are growing in value with the rapid increase of the 
world's industrial population. 

Ambition to control the Berhn-Bagdad route — as part of the 
Pan-German scheme — was one of the causes of Germany's hostility 
to England before the war. The rich trade of India and the Orient, 
including the East Indies, makes the possession of these regions 
a commercial advantage. Together, India and China possess more 



74 



The New World 



[nterna- 
tional ri- 
valry for 
the wealth 
of Meso- 
potamia 



The oil of 
Mesopo- 
tamia and 
the British 
commercial 
fleet 



than 40 per cent of the world's population. China also has vast un- 
touched resources of iron and coal, and were they to be developed and 
the population industrialized, these resources would become a source 
of economic power with which an ambitious nation could control vir- 
tually the whole world. Mesopotamia, by reason of its position be- 
tween the industrial nations of the West and the undeveloped popu- 
lations of the East, becomes a critical region, a true problem area. 

England's occupation of the region, including her development 
of its resources and her relations with the native, will be challenged 
by her rivals, the more so because her control of Mesopotamia 
will not end with this territory alone. To the north lies Kurdistan ; 
to the west lies the Arab realm ; to the east lies Persia. In each 
one of these regions other powers have what they regard as vital in- 
terests, and they will not stand by and see the region exploited for the 
benefit of British capital only. The English have been enterpris- 
ing and successful hitherto in many of their political ventures, but 
they have here a problem that will fully test their administrative 
powers. 

Those who challenge the British claim to the occupation of Meso- 
potamia have to recognize, however, that if Great Britain's hold 
were relaxed, rival ambitions and native intrigue would surely make 
this a field of disorder, to the injury not only of Great Britain but 
of France and Persia as well. At least until affairs become orderly 
again, the peace *of the world demands that the region be held, if not 
by England, at least by some other strong power. 

Wliile irrigation may furnish the basis for the cliief riches of Meso- 
potamia, the inunediate wealth of the country hes principally in trade 
and in the development of the oil resources (Fig. 230). The produc- 
tion of the Persian and Mesopotamian fields is small at the present 
time, but the reserve is great, and this is a matter of prime impor- 
tance to Great Britain, whose navy depends chiefly upon oil fpr fuel, 
and whose commercial carriers are being turned into oil burners at a 
rapid rate. Late in 1919 plans were made calling for the development 
of huge oil refineries at Swansea in southern Wales, and already large 
refineries have been established at Abadan on the Shatt el Arab (Fig. 
32). The control of the world's oil supply is a matter of great con- 
cern, and it will form the basis of one of the keenest conunercial 
rivalries of the next fifty years. Thus Mesopotamia means not only 
problems of land, frontiers, natives, railroads, and river steamers ; it 
is also vitally related to one of the many life streams that support the 
British commercial fleet. 



Problems of Imperial Britain 15 

In many respects the occupation of Mesopotamia is an exception Occupation 
to the estabhshed British policy of keeping to islands, as in New tamia a°^° 
Zealand and Jamaica, or to relatively detached areas, like Australia departure 
or Egypt, or to strategic ports, as at Walvis Bay and Aden, or to ditionai 
peninsulas partly shut off from the interior by mountains or forests ^"^^^p°^" 
or deserts, as India, the Straits Settlements, and North Borneo. 
Mesopotamia is an alluvial basin bordered by tablelands and moun- 
tains inliabited by restless, unruly, noioiadic, and fanatical Moslem 
peoples who, both far and near, have overrun the basin time and 
again, and who will not leave Great Britain to occupy peacefully a 
rich land which is their traditional prey. Like India, Mesopotamia 
will have its problem of a northwest frontier, and in an equally 
dangerous and costly form. 

"THE GOSPEL OF EMPIRE 
IS THERE OIL IN MESOPOTAMIA?" 

In this headline from a London paper ^ we have illustrated the Two op- 
opposition between two divergent theories of political control for yiews^of 
British protected areas and mandates. British 

(1) There is the principle that, taking advantage of mandatory 
power assigned to it. Great Britain may encourage the development of 
resources of special interest to British citizens. The British public 
would thereby pay what might be called the overhead charges in 
maintaining opportunities and privileges which would be of financial 
benefit only to the private trader. Once accepted, this policy leads 
naturally to the strongly developed tendency to give protection and 
special benefits to the British trader, since British taxpayers are pay- 
ing the costs of goverimient and desire to see concrete financial com- 
pensation. To a like degree there would develop a tendency to give 
special favors to the British trader rather than to the native trader, 
who by himself is incapable of organizing a strong government. 

(2) Opposed to this principle is the theory of protection for the 
benefit of aU, the native and the non-British subject to have equal 
opportunities with the British trader. This clearly requires altru- 
ism on the part of the British taxpayer, who reaps no advantage 
in holding the territory, except the indirect benefits conferred upon 
the British citizen due to the increase of trade. To put into practice 
such a policy is an uphill task. 

The enduring wealth of Mesopotamia is the extraordinary fertility 
of the soil. It is competently estimated that the average combined 

1 The Daily Herald, 26 March 1920. 



76 The New World 

Theirriga- discharge of the Tigris-Euphrates rivers would irrigate 7,000,000 
sibuitiet acrcs ill winter and 3,000,000 acres of varied crops in summer. Half 
of this area could be inamediately reclaimed if the ancient system of 
canals and drains were restored, and the Euphrates water turned into 
the land west of the Tigris, while the Tigris and its tributaries were 
made to irrigate the land east of the Tigris. It is even suggested that 
for the better utilization of their waters for irrigation purposes, 
the rivers should not be used for navigation, but should be super- 
seded by railways for the transport of cereals and cotton. 



CHAPTER THREE 

POLITICAL AND COLONIAL AIMS OF FRANCE 

(A) Readjustment and Reorganization 

Had it not been for the temperamental flexibility of her people, the what the 
war of 1914-1918 might have ruined France. Almost the whole FrYnce^* 
world eventually came to her aid, but it should not be forgotten that 
she also helped herseK through a courageous expenditure of her energies 
and resources that now brings her a crop of after-war troubles of the 
gravest import. More than 1,400,000 of her soldiers were killed. Of 
these about half came from French farms, and almost all of them were 
young men, whose death resulted in a heavy capital loss to the state. 
Her soil and forests were devastated in a large part of the occupied 
region; her mills were destroyed in the most highly industrialized 
part of her territory ; and her coal mines were damaged so seriously 
that it will take several years to restore them to full productivity. 
She lost 30 per cent of her shipping. Three milHon head of cattle 
were taken by Germany in the occupied region. Every Allied army 
operating in France had to get a large part of its mine-timber and 
railway ties as well as road metal in France. Her ports, never large 
enough for her own normal needs had to be occupied in large part 
by British and American engineers. Her farming and industrial popu- 
lations were displaced. In consequence, the whole economic life of 
France must be made over, owing to the disturbance caused by the 
abnormal arrangements of the war. 

To be sure, there was some financial return to France during the war, Recon- 
in that more money was spent by the Allied armies in France than ^ difficuu 
in any other country. On the other hand, she had so little coal, her and costly 
industrial machinery was so badly deranged, her manufacturing 
energies had to be spent so largely on big guns, ammunition, and the 
repair and replacement of the material wastage of war, that she was 
compelled to make a large part of her purchases for her ordinary 
needs and for much of her ammunition in the United States and in 
England. 

The problems of France are therefore largely those of reconstruction 
— to set going again her national machinery. To develop her own 
mills and factories to the pre-war point and to turn back into their 
old channels the forces of labor and capital will require years of 
patient adjustment. Remaking her industrial organization will also 
create new social and political problems that may threaten the internal 
peace of France. 

77 



78 



The New World 



THE BURDEN OF WAR COSTS 



The effect 
of the dis- 
covery that 
Germany 
could not 
pay war 
costs 



Impossi- 
bility of ad- 
minister- 
ing the 
whole of 
Germany 



In the first place, every Frenchman took for granted what Lloyd 
George felt obliged to promise the British people in December 1918 — 
that Germany could be made to pay the costs of the war ; it was in that 
expectation that many men had toiled and fought during four years 
of war. It was likewise expected that the biU to Germany should 
include compensation for all the damage done to civilian property. 
When the war ended and a settlement came to be made, it was dis- 
covered that Germany had destroyed so much that she could never 
pay the damage in addition to the costs of war. This was a terrible 
blow to France. The effect on the French spirit was not unlike that 
of a great military defeat. 

People had lost sight of the fact that the war had cost the Allies 
more than twice Germany's total wealth before the war and much 
more than the combined national wealth of all the enemy powers. 
If absolutely everything in Germany could have been confiscated and 
sold for what it was normally worth, the total would have amounted 
to less than one half the war expenditures of the Allies alone*., In 
addition, Germany's own debt amounted to one half her total wealth. 
In short, the costs of the war could not be repaid. 

But there were other reasons than its inadequacy against such a 
confiscation of German wealth. It would have reduced the Ger- 
man people to economic slavery, and the administration of Germany 
under such conditions would have cost much more in trouble and 
money than the value of the goods produced. It was impossible to 
escape the fact that, in the last analysis, only those reparation pay- 
ments would be of value which were made in goods or in services. To 
confiscate iuimovable German property would not have helped at 
all, since only those goods (or their equivalent in sound, not inflated, 
money) which could be moved to Allied countries could be of the 
slightest value to the Allies. 

In other words, if reparation payments were to be of value they must 
be made outside of Germany — at London, Paris, Rome, or New York ; 
for as long as either money or goods remained in Germany they could 
be of use only to Germans. This meant, of course, that reparation 
payments must be made over a term of years, since Germany's 
national income in any single year would amount to but a very small 
percentage (about 5 per cent) of the total costs of the war. It also 
meant that Germany must produce a great deal more than she con- 
sumed, if large payments were to be made. That is, Germany must 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



79 




tt^^N^^x^^T^^^^^^ys^^^ysiy 



Pig. 33. Relief map of France, based on Vidal Lablache. North of the line^-^', one third of 
all persons engaged in gainful pursuits are employed in industry (as derived from Album graphique 
et statistique de la France, 1907, p. 82). This is the chief industrial region of France and was the 
seat of the German invasions of 1870 and of 1914-1918. The plains of Belgium are continuous 
with those of northern France. It was by way of Liege, Brussels, and Lille that the German 
armies invaded France in 1914, reaching in a few weeks a point within a few miles of Paris. Note 
the position of Alsace-Lorraine and the defensive value of the Rhine. 



be allowed to prosper in order to pay a large indemnity, and of course 
a certain part of this prosperity could be won only at the ex])ense of 
the nations with whom Germany would compete for world trade. 

Finally, the Allies saw that even to confiscate Germany's gold re- why Ger- 
serve would be unwise. Paper money has no value in itself ; its value gold re- 
depends upon the willingness of people to accept it, and that in turn f^^g j^^f 
depends upon the ability of the government to redeem it in gold in Germany 
or silver upon demand. When the Germans occupied Poland and 
Serbia and Rumania, they issued floods of paper money based upon 
their small gold reserve. This paper money would be worthless if 
there did not exist the possibility that it could be exchanged for gold. 



80 



The New World 



France 
obliged to 
pay her 
own war 
costs 



The labor- 
ing classes 
and taxes 



How 

France met 
the prob- 
lem of 
demobili- 
zation 



For the Allies to take away Germany's gold reserve would mean the ruin 
of thousands of people who had accepted the paper money (based on 
that reserve) or who had had it forced upon them. Furthermore, the 
Eunount of Germany's gold reserve was only $700,000,000, and the 
estimated war costs of the Allies are several hundred times as large. 

Reluctantly French economists came to see that it would be best 
to leave Germany's gold in her own hands, let her run her own gov- 
ernment, including her railways, and obtain payments by taking 
from her the products of her industry or their equivalent in value. 
In other words, German labor for many years to come, rather than 
present German capital, would have to pay the bill. Even then the 
money that could be extracted and still leave German industry a 
basis on which to continue would be enough only to restore the dam- 
age to civilian property. The war costs of France must be paid by the 
French people themselves. 

The realization of these facts produced a profound impression in 
French labor circles, where it was at last clearly seen that for a long 
time there will be heavy taxes to pay for a war that was forced on 
France by Germany. Laboring men object the more because during 
the war French capital did not pay nearly so high as British and 
American capital; income taxes and excess-profits taxes were lower 
in France. Yet during all that time the cost of living was mounting 
rapidly. 

The French government therefore tried to avoid labor troubles 
by demobilizing slowly, so that the returning soldiers might be found 
employment as rapidly as they became free from army discipline. 
Societies were organized to assist locally. The government lent its 
aid to rebuild the devastated regions of northern France. These 
measures, with the granting of small pensions for temporarily un- 
employed soldiers, made the return to normal conditions of life easier 
than it would otherwise have been, and also safer for the country. 



The return 
of Alsace- 
Lorraine 



PROBLEMS OF THE EASTERN BORDER 

One of the largest territorial gains made by France as a result of 
the World War was due to the recovery of Alsace-Lorraine (5600 
square miles). These provinces were taken away in 1871, following 
the Franco-Prussian War. They are inhabited chiefly by Germans 
in the central and eastern portions, and by French on the west. 
Nearly half of Lorraine is occupied by a French-speaking majority, 
but only 6 per cent of the area of Alsace. As a whole the people are 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



81 



TREATY OF 






1 ^•i^" /^-^ 


VERDUN 






r\^^-'''^[ . 


843 


^ 


/Tf 




ci^C^^'^^-^r-^ 






z ? 


O v-^ A •\r-7. 


^sJkingdom 


vCV\ r> 

i -f-i 


% '^x * 

V^^ 


S OF 


ji 




AcHARLESr 


^n-^T^o-^v/ 1 


/ > 


^ 


°> ^^\ 




s 


/^'^ V V. 


Xs .X 


"^ 


^^K 



unquestionably Fre-nch in sympathy. To 
have these provinces held by Germany 
was intensely irritating to French pride, 
and their return became one of the ob- 
jects of the war. Resentment toward 
Germany was the more bitten because the 
iron ore of Lorraine was one of the bases 
of German industry, and possession of it 
proved to be a marked advantage in a 
war largely based on machinery and steel. Fig. 34. The narrow belt of country 

rm , p xi • 1 1 i between France and Germany is an 

The return ot the provmces adds to old zone of friction, it was once held 

France a population of 1,900,000. It gives as a separate kingdom, as shown 

'- . - iii'T-' above. The idea of creating a line 

her also the richest iron-ore beds 01 Europe, of buffer states in the same general 

thus enabling her to become a great pro- IJ^tSmT l^rSt^r.™' "■" 
ducer of iron and steel to provide for her 

own normal needs, to restore the devastated areas, and to export to her 
colonies and elsewhere. It was from Lorraine that Germany derived 
75 per cent (21,000,000 long tons) of aU the iron mined in the empire. 
Alsace has oil wells at Pechelbronn, and at Wittelsheim there is one 
of the two greatest potash deposits in the world, the other being at 
Stassfurt in Germany. The Saar basin coal deposits extend into 
northern Lorraine, and there are also valuable salt deposits. In 
contrast to the mineral resources of Lorraine, and the industries de- 
pendent upon them, is the great agricultural production of Alsace. 
Its soil is a marked addition to the wealth of France. 

I The return of Alsace-Lorraine brought up an interesting rehgious The re 
problem, seeing that during the period of their occupation by Ger- 
many these provinces did not share with the rest of France the rup- 
ture between church and state. And in Alsace-Lorraine the clerical 
party is quite as strongly religious and Cathohc as it is Francophile. 
This situation has led French leaders to take steps to restore diplo- 
matic relations with the Vatican, a plan which received great im- 
petus in the administration of Millerand, following Clemenceau. The 
result will be to weld the provinces still more firmly to France, 
while at the same time French foreign problems wiU receive far more 
sympathetic consideration in Spain and Italy, where powerful clerical 
influences are important in the management of political relations. 
France wiU benefit also by the support that the Vatican may give her 
in the settlement of the Turkish problem, for the Vatican is concerned 
in the treatment of the Christian populations in Asia Minor and Syria, 
and in the disposition of the shrines of Palestine. 



ligious 
leaning of 
Alsace-Lor- 
raine 



82 



The New World 




>"■> j^v^ Trier 

BELGIUMS Xm'emlKLr(/\^ G E 



ron 

W^^ Coal (with seams) 
^SSS^. Potash 

Salt 

Petroleum 

10 20 30 




Fig. 35. Mineral resources and principal water communications in the Alsace-Lorraine region. 
By taking tliese two districts from France in 1871, Germany deprived France of the strategic 
frontier of the Rhine and won for herself immense iron-ore resources that were of increasing 
value in Germany's modern period of industrial development and overseas commerce. A new 
well at greater depths than hitherto reached has located large reserves of petroleum at Pechel- 
bronn (1920). Petroleum products to the amount of 50,000 tons are now derived annually at 
this locality. After Gallois, the Geographical Revicv:, August 1918. 

It will be a great temptation to the French people to interfere 
in the affairs of the region called the Left Bank of the Rhine, for it is 
here that French military men would like to create a buffer state in 
which there should be no danger of German military preparations 
against France. The idea is a tempting one, though we must remem- 
ber that the people are German and not French. For twenty years 
before the treaty of Vienna (1815) made it Prussian, the Rhineland 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



83 



Diesel \ 

Essen bDortmimd 
sl)urg 

Tseldorf 



oSieg'en 



oGiessen 
°Wetzlar 



was French, and there is still 
a certain pro-French element 
mindful of the prosperity and 
democracy of the days when it 
was a part of France. Many 
people hoped to see the region 
become self-governing or in 
some way attached to France. 
If local self-governing geo- 
graphical divisions are set up 
in a future Germany, the 
Rliineland will probably be- 
come one of the principal di- 
visions. 

When a few of the people 
in the region started a sepa- 
ratist movement at the end of 
the war and proclaimed the 
"Republic of the Left Bank of 
the Rhine," they immediately 
won French sympathy. At the 
peace conference it was urged 
by some Frenchmen that Al- 
lied, or at least French, mili- 
tary occupation of the region 
was necessary for a long time 
to come. This should not be 
hastily branded as mere impe- 
rial design ; for more than four 

years the sound of artillery fire Fig- 36. The Saar district (diagonally ruled) ; the . 

ui^l, J +r>" •+ -^^^^ Bank (stippled area west of the Rhine); and 
could, be neard at Fans ; it the bridgeheads and adjacent territory east of the 

takes but an hour to drive from ^^^^f.- ^^^J^.^* ^° temporary Allied control and to 

demilitarization. 

the city to the nearest battle- 
fields of the war ; there was almost nightly danger of air raids ; the 
nerves of the French people had been strained to the limit of endurance, 
and the effect on many French children will last throughout their life- 
times. With victory in her hands, France passionately desired to be 
free from the long-standing menace of German invasion. 

France has gained important advantages in the region of the Left 
Bank. The Allied armies are to occupy it for fifteen years, with- 
drawing their troops from each of three successive zones at five-year 




The 
Rhineland 



84 



The Xew World 



Control of 
Rhine navi- 
gation 



Liixem- 
burg also 
a buffer 
state, long 
under Ger- 
man in- 
fluence 



Inter- 
national 
status of 
the Saar 
region 



intervals. All the fortifications in the region are to be destroyed, 
likewise those in the strip thirty miles wide, east of the Rhine. The 
occupied territory is to be governed by an Interallied Rhineland High 
Conmiission. 

By the treaty of Frankfort (1871) the eastern frontier of France 
was pushed back from the Rhine; by the treaty of Versailles (1919) 
France once more becomes a Rhine power. Regulation of the traffic 
of the river had been conducted by the Central Commission for the 
Navigation of the Rhine created by the Mannheim Convention of 
1868. But neither France nor Belgium, and not even Switzerland, was 
represented. France now has four representatives, and the other 
powers, including Italy and Great Britain, have two each. The 
powers of the cormuission are extended to include the upper Rhine 
between Basel and Lake Constance, if Switzerland agrees, and, in the 
interests of Belgimn, the lower Moselle with its connecting canals. 
By special treaty provision the port of Kehl (Fig. 35) is joined to that 
of Strasbourg for seven years, in order that the port facihties of 
Strasbourg may be developed more conveniently. 

The foregoing facts help us to understand why France wished to 
secure control of Luxemburg. For Luxemburg, as may be seen by 
reference to Figure 36, is in the narrow frontier belt, even" part of 
wliich has high strategic importance. Tliis duchy was taken into 
the German Customs L iiion ahuost eighty years ago ; its ruhng house 
had a German origin; its railways were bmlt by German capital; 
it has valuable iron mines that were used by the Germans during 
the war as one of their sources of steel for sheU and cannon. Clearly 
Luxemburg could not be returned to German control, and its small 
population ('•260,000) and area (1000 square miles) do not permit it to 
stand alone either pohtically or economically. It had been taken from 
Belgium in 1839, but in the plebiscite of September 1919 it voted to 
enter the French Customs L iiion. French control of its iron mines 
and blast furnaces is incAdtable. Tlie small duchy is virtually a 
dependency of France. 

There remains the problem of the Saar. This region consists essen- 
tially of a coal basin from which, before the war. Germany obtained 
about 9 per cent of her total coal supply, or more than 17.400.000 
metric tons. The coal reserves of the Saar are 17,000,000,000 tons, 
or a thousand times the annual production and 22 per cent of the 
total reserves of Germany in 1913. France was poor in coal and 
had practically no petroleimi at aU. \Miat she wished to secure was 
outright ownership of the region. Eventually she obtained outright 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



^5 




86 



The New World 



Temporary 
military 
control of 
the Saar 
basin 



French 
political 
and mili- 
tary inter- 
ests on 
Germany's 
frontiers 




ownership of the mines 
(which were also placed 
in the French Customs 
Union), as compensation 
for the damages inflicted 
by the Germans on the 
French mines at Lens 
and Valenciennes, where 
the shafting was blown 
out by dynamite and the 
galleries were flooded. 
At the end of fifteen 

Fig. 38. The Saar district of the treaty of Versailles. It ycarS a plebiscite mUSt 
includes by far the larger part of the Saar coal basin i i i i • .1 o 

(Fig. 35). be held m the !:5aar region, 

and the inhabitants will 
then be permitted to vote on their future ownership, whether by 
France or by Germany. But provision is made for the exclusion of 
immigrants, whether French or German, from the privilege of the 
plebiscite. Only those may vote who will have attained the age of 
twenty and who resided in the Saar district when the treaty with 
Germany went into effect. 

Until the treaty of Versailles went into effect on 10 January lO'^O, 
the control of the Saar basin was in the hands of the military au- 
thorities. There was a short period of strikes, together with general 
disorder and some piUage. This disturbance proved to be the work 
of persons from outside the region, more than seven hundred of whom 
were arrested. Eight of these were condemned to twenty years of 
forced labor, and others to five or ten years ; one was executed. By 
the terms of later French decrees the expulsion of pohtical agitators 
ceased ; some already sent away were invited to return ; and a larger 
degree of self-government was promised the people, most of whom 
have offered no active opposition to French occupation. 

France is indeed beset by problems that arise because of her con- 
tact with Germany. Practically all of France's mineral resources 
(Fig. 40) and most of her great manufacturing cities (Fig. 33) are 
grouped along the German frontier — and Germany will always be in 
need of all the coal and iron she can get and may again be tempted 
to seize a neighbor's supply just over the border. Is it surprising that 
many French statesmen are anxious when they look towards the future ? 

This anxiety as to possible future action by Germany is most clearly 
seen in the eagerness with which French diplomats have reached 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



87 



understandings with Rumania and some of the new states created 
by the Peace Conference of Paris, especially Czecho-Slovakia and 
Poland. The French detailed well-known generals to help develop 
the armies of these states, and appear to have succeeded in effect- 
ing friendly alliances with their governments. With their support 
France would naturally feel more secure. In this connection it is 
necessary to add that in acting as guide and friend to the young 
and untried nations France has assumed a very real responsibility. 
Each of the new states wiU often find its position difficult, and the 
possibihties of friction with neighboring states will be many; it will 
often be tempted to resort to force to gain its ends. The peace of 
Europe may well depend chiefly upon the kind of advice and sup- 
port that France gives to the new states of central Europe. 



THE GREAT NEEDS OF FRANCE 



France needs two things to put her on terms of equality with 
Germany, her ancient foe. She needs a higher birth rate, and she 
needs a complete awakening and reorganization of her economic life. 

As long as the population of France remains at a standstill and The lower- 
that of Germany increases, there will be a steady ethnic penetration j.^^^^^^*^ 
by German-speaking people, against which France cannot effectively France 
contend. Germany has a population of 60,000,000 ; France has less 
than 40,000,000. The birth rate of France just offset the death 
rate in 1913 ; in 1918 the population of France declined 190,000, 
not counting the war losses and the deaths due to an epidemic of 
grippe. In Germany there was persistent increase in the years be- 
fore the war period. Unless the situation in France improves, the 
French people, declining relatively in numbers, will decline in power 
also. To study the problem more effectively and provide practical 
measures, a national bureau was created in January 1920, dealing 
with the question of the birth rate. The acquisition of the Saar coal 
and the Lorraine iron may take on a new significance in relation to 
the future population of France. A recent writer has argued the 
close relation between coal production and the birth rate ; he points 
to the fact that it was the coal and iron districts of Germany that 
had the greatest increase of population since 1871. 

The second of France's great domestic problems is how to place The sWp- 
her industries on a pre-war basis. During the war her manufacturing f^^ ^^°^' 
energy was turned largely to the making of guns for herself and her 
allies, while England built ships and created great reserves of ammuni- 



88 



The Xeic TT'orW 



The eco- 
nomic prob- 
lems of 
France 



MOVEMENT OF POPULATION 
J. 1901-191 





^^ 



tion. By the treaty of 
peace England has her 
merchant marine nearly 
restored. ; France, ho>Y- 
ever. gets relatively few 
.j^ ships as a result of the 
division of the German 
merchant marine. Even 
before the "war France 
had a ship deficit, and 
now she needs raw ma- 
terials more than ever. 
At the present time the 
cost of building ships is 
excessively high, and 
the difficulty of France 
is correspondingly 



°Teat. 

Fig. 39. Tlie large estaUished centers of population and most ^ 

of the industrial regions show increase of population. Rural Xo awakcU the CCO- 

France shows general decrease. Ftoid. m^v in ttxe Gtoffraphi^ral • tp e- f-^ 

Journal. Vd. 40. 1912. nOUllC hfc of FraUCC IS 

perhaps less difficult 
than to solve the problem of the lowering birth rate, but it is only 
slightly less difficult. France is an old country, with life adjusted 
to her resources and to modes of thought and work against which 
modern ideas have long beaten in vain. This adjustment has some 
advantages : the hfe of such a nation is steadier. But the disad- 
vantages also are great, and of this fact the ports of France furnish 
an example. Control of a given port is diWded between more 
than half a dozen different government authorities. For example, at 
Ha^Te the Ministry of Pubhc Works can build the docks, but the 
French Ministry of Marine controls the pilot service, the Minister of 
Commerce is responsible for the warehouses, the Minister of Finance 
collects the dues and regulates the hours of work, and the Minister 
of the Interior pohces and hghts the quays. WTiereas in most of 
the world's ports it takes but a few years to carry out improvements, 
here it takes many years. All French ports, even Paris, the largest 
of all. have obsolete rules for their regulation and are years behind the 
ports of America and Great Britain in administration. ' Even before 
the war these rules interfered in the most serious manner with the 
development of French trade. 

Turning to the industrial field, we see that French iron and steel 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 89 

plants need more coal than France herself will be able to supply for increased 
several years, even with the addition of the Saar fields. Part of the Jr**on assets 
lack will be supphed from Germany under the clauses of the treaty of °^ France 
Versailles relating to the importation of coal, but tliis is a temporary 
measure. A soimd solution requires efficient handling of the whole 
coal and iron problem of the region of which Lorraine and the Saar 
are a part. 

Since several tons of coal are needed to smelt one ton of iron, it is in Relation of 
general cheaper to carry iron to coal. To reverse the process would be ^aUo° 
to increase the cost of iron and steel goods and diminish the chances French iron 
of successful French competition in foreign markets. But the coal 
fields are still chiefly in Germany, Westphalia having the largest 
reserves of coking coal in continental Europe. In 1913 Westphaha 
produced C9 per cent of the coke used in reducing the Lorraine iron 
ore, the Saar only 15 per cent, and France 12 per cent. If we look 
into the future the story is the same. Of estimated reserves of coal 
in fields tributary to the Lorraine iron districts, Westphalia has 62 
per cent, the Saar only 19 per cent. The Rhine valley and Belgium 
offer cheap canal and rail transportation. Though some iron ore can 
be economically smelted in France with imported coke from Germany, 
Belgium, and England, some also would naturally be shipped to 
western Germany for smelling, since the Saar coking coal is inferior 
in quality and offers only local competition to German coke. The 
result of shipping iron ore to Germany for smelting and manufacture 
would be improvement of German industry and quicker reparation 
payments to the Allies. These facts will help in understanding 
future agreements between France and Germany relating to iron and 
coal shipments and industries. Such agreements are bound to come 
in time, for they are distinctly to the advantage of both parties. 

In this connection it may be noted that France has obtained large 
interests in Luxemburg blast furnaces, and that whatever her arrange- 
ments with Germany, she will have an excess of iron and steel above 
her ordinary needs. This wiU help her foreign trade in China, South 
America, Asia Minor, Italy, and the Balkans, and it will also help in 
the rebuilding of the devastated and occupied areas of northeastern 
France. 

One of the current questions of more than local interest relates to The ne- 
the internal administration of France and the effect upon the national p^if^*/^/"' 
spirit. Partly by reason of its geographical position, partly through and eco- 
sentiment and the influence of the national capital, partly because the "ei^aUzl- 
functions of government have been centralized there ever since the ^°^ 



90 



The Neio World 




Fig. 40. The concentration of France's mineral resources and industries on her northeastern 
frontier is shown. Though iron and coal deposits are rather generally distributed, those of greatest 
* commercial value are in the eastern districts, where more than half of the iron and steel products 
are manufactured. According to United Stales Commerce Reports for 1919 and 1920, the cen- 
tral districts of France produced in 1919 but 12 per cent of the steel, the southwestern 4 per 
cent, the western 3 per cent, and the southeastern 3 per cent. Alsace-Lorraine in the first six 
months of 1919 produced 32 per cent of all the steel manufactured in France. The total 
water-power development by 1921 will be 1,500,000 horsepower, or 20 per cent of the total avail- 
able. The Alps, central France, and the Pyrenees are the chief centers of development. By 
"Regional industries" are meant industries based upon products derived directly from the 
soil. After Vidal Lablache, supplemented by World Atlas of Commercial Geology, Part I, 
Distribution of Mineral Production, United States Geological Survey, 1921. 

days of Napoleon, who used this method to consohdate his personal 
power, Paris has played a part in the economic hfe of France out of 
proportion to her industrial advantages. The ninety administrative 
units of the country — the departements — are artificial divisions, 
with few geographical or economic bases. Nearly all the local func- 
tionaries are appointed by the central government or by its local 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 91 

representatives, and even the mayors of the towns are under its con- 
trol. In later years, however, the increase in the speed of telegraphic 
and other communication has enabled the provincial newspapers 
to pubhsh the world's news long before the Parisian newspapers can 
reach the provinces. Thus the provinces have come to have opinions 
of their own on the happenings of the day. In addition, the people 
are demanding a greater share of power in the settlement of their local 
affairs. Consequently, there is a strong movement for a measure of 
goverimiental decentralization, and it has even been proposed to 
divide the country into a number of geographical regions, each several 
times the size of the existing departements, for purposes of local ad- 
ministration. It is thought that such regional capitals would become 
strong centers of intellectual and political life and would increase the 
pohtical strength of the country as a whole. 



RELATIONS WITH THE COLONIES 

Unlike England, France has no problem of satisfying the growing French 
demands of self-governing dominions. AH the overseas possessions resp^ncV 
of France are directly dependent upon the central French govern- tuities 
ment. Very heavy responsibilities remain, nevertheless, because 
France had rapidly expanded her colonial possessions before the war 
and now gains additional territory. She has acquired a mandatary over 
Syria, has divided with Great Britain the Cameroons and Togoland 
as mandatory colonies, and has had her status in northern Africa 
confirmed by the great powers. Figure 49 shows her new territorial 
gains in Africa as a result of the war. 

It may be safely predicted that French colonial rule will be of a Morocco 
high order. The example of Morocco is heartening. Under the ^f a sample 

i.../>ii pr> .1 °^ what 

wise administration of able army oincers, assisted by. a few civilian France can 
officials, the country has become safe and orderly, and every advantage coionier 
has been given the native to help him improve his lot. Development 
has not merely produced railways, automobile and wagon roads, 
and mines ; it has also improved public health and education. 

It is the thought of some of her wisest leaders that it would be Advisa- 
greatly to the interest of France if she were to make no further efforts ^1^^*^ °}. 

. f, . . 1 . , discarding 

in the field of imperial expansion. The world has now been parceled the old 
out nearly to the limit of vacant "political space." France formerly p^og^ram 
opposed British expansion in Africa and in the Persian Gulf region, 
and German expansion in central Africa and Turkey. Further pos- 
sible gains are not worth the price of diplomatic quarrels and perhaps 



92 



The New World 



war. Of diverse peoples in widely scattered lands, France now has 
all that she can well manage. To her at this time is applicable in 
a peculiarly strong sense the principle that "the test of mastery is 
restraint." 

(B) Special Colonial Interests of France 

With this general view of the problems of the French people, we 
may now look at their special colonial interests as developed by the 
results of the war. We shall not examine each colony in detail, but 
shall select for consideration only those that present political or com- 
mercial problems of the first rank. Among them two are predominant, 
— Syria and French North Africa. 



His- 
torical im- 
portance of 
Syria 



The racial 
mixtures 
of Syria 



SYRIA 

From every standpoint the problem of Syria is the more vexatious 
of the two, partly by reason of the strong dislike for the French among 
the native Syrians (Arabs chiefly), partly because French and British 
interests intermingle in a complex and even dangerous manner. Here 
we have an echo of the past. "Nowhere else has so much history 
run into or through so narrow a space," it has been said, and "The 
military liistory of Syria may be pictured as the procession of nearly 
all the world's conquerors" — from Thotlmies to Tamerlane and 
Napoleon. 

While the Turk has administered Syria, he has been an alien there. 
He has not settled upon the land in any nmnbers, and separate Turk- 
ish colonies do not exist in Syria. There are few social and family ties 
between Turks and Syrians. The removal of the Turk from Syria 
therefore involves no important social or economic readjustments. 

Syria is one of the most densely populated portions of the former 
Turkish Empire. Though a mere coastal strip, barely fifty miles 
wide and three hundred miles long, it has nearly 3,000,000 people, 
of whom two thirds are Moslems. There are also nearly 500,000 
Christians and 125,000 Druses. Racially the Syrians are of higlily 
mixed origin: Hittites, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Turks, 
and Assyrians, not to mention lesser folk. In the mountain val- 
leys of the Lebanon itself and in central Syria live the Druses, 
warlike tribes sharing the Lebanon with the agricultural Maronites, 
whom they frequently raid. On the grassy seaward slopes of the 
mountains bordering the GuK of Alexandretta are the settlements 
of the Ansarirebs. 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



93 




94 



The New World 



Gate- 
ways of 
Syria 



Damascus 
as a com- 
mercial 
and politi- 
cal focus 



Beginning 
of French 
interest in 
Syria dur- 
ing the 
Crusades " 



The Taurus ranges shut Syria off from the Anatohan plain (Fig. 42), 
for the great pass in the Taurus, called the Cilician Gates (Pylse 
Cihcise), has long been in Turkish hands. The effective northern 
frontier has been the ranges of the Amanus Mountains, with a pas- 
sageway at the Syrian Gates (Pylse Syrise). The mountains of Leba- 
non terminate Syria on the south, though the Syrian claims include 
Palestine and even the peninsula of Sinai on the Red Sea. 

A desert separates Syria from Mesopotamia. On the eastern bor- 
der of the better-watered coastal strip are the sown lands, the grain- 
growing regions. One of the richest of these is Damascus and the belt 
of country south of it. 

Damascus hes well out in the desert, and a desert strip separates 
it from the sown land on the west. It is far from the sea and does 
not lie on a natural route of commerce. Yet it has endured from the 
earliest times by reason of its advantageous situation on the alluvial 
deposits of a river that runs eastward from the mountains and waters 
a hundred and fifty square miles of otherwise desert land. It is the 
oldest, the largest, the richest of the cities of Syria, an object of em- 
pire throughout its history, and of sufficient political importance to 
draw to it much of the through trade that would follow other natural 
courses if topographical considerations only were taken into account. 
The population of Damascus exceeds 250,000. 

The interests of France' in Syria do not date from recent times. 
From the days of the early Phoenician traders, long before the Chris- 
tian era, Marseilles in southern France had maintained commercial 
intercourse with Syria, and the relationsliip has remained unbroken 
to this day. During the Crusades, France took the lead in the effort 
to redeem the Holy Land from Mohammedan conquerors. It was 
quite a natural tiling that Frenchmen should thereafter become 
the rulers of Syria. Antioch and Tripoli had French princes, Jeru- 
salem a French king. France, "the eldest daughter of the Church," 
had played a noble part in the redemption of lands sacred to Chris- 
tians, and in recognition thereof the Pope conferred on French kings 
the title of "Protector of Oriental Christians." Castles in the French 
style were built in Syria ; Marseilles, in competition with Genoa and 
Venice, established commercial and political ties. Silks, pearls, 
spices, and camphor were brought from India to Palestine and Syria, 
and thence to France, Germany, and England. 

The material aspects of French interest in northern Syria are dis- 
played chiefly in the silk industry and the railroads. Excepting the 
Hedjaz Hne, every railroad in the country has been financed by French 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



95 




Fig. 42. The upper panel shows the region through which the French in Syria and the British 
in Mesopotamia will maintain mutual trade relations. The lower panel locates places of 
historical interest in relation to modern towns and ports. See also Figure 44. 



96 



The New World 




DENSITY OF POPULATION 
persq.mile 

under SO 
50 too 
overlOO 



Region ofnomad/sm 



a&. 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



97 




Railroads 
and the 
silk in- 
dustry in 
Lebanon 



French 
schools in 
Syria 



q Principality 
^ "^ of Antioch 

^ A CovLTtty of 



capital. The silk factories of 
Lebanon, the most important 
single industry in the country, 
were founded by Frenchmen, 
and their annual product, es- 
timated at a miUion pounds of 
silk, is exported to France. 

To all these long-standing 
causes of interest in the po- 
litical affairs and trade of the 
Syrian coast, there has been 
added the effect of French 
thought and life on the people 
of Syria. French schools are 
more numerous throughout the 
former Turkish territories than 
those of any other nation. 

There is need of France in 
Syria and elsewhere in the 
Near East, in the interests of 
western civilization and as a 
barrier against anarchy and 
Mohammedanism. England 
alone is unequal to the task. 

The growth of the desire for independence among the Syrians, as The Damas- 
opposed to French control, is shown in a specific way by the action of ^^1^°' 
the General Syrian Congress held at Damascus on 2 July 1919. This 
congress is one of the most important poUtical events in the past 
several years in Syria. The principal features of its program (the 
so-called Damascus program) are as follows : 

(1) Complete political independence. 

(2) Constitutional monarchy with the rights of minorities guar- 
anteed. 

(3) Assistance from the United States for twenty years in financial 
and technical matters. 



A -Antioch E=Edessa S=Sain.osata 
D=Dffniascus J= Jerusalem. T=Tripoli - 
St. J.=St. Jean dAcre 



THE GEOGR.REVIEW.SEPT.iflia 



_|jHiLtt: 



Fig. 44, 



Syria under French princes, after the 
Crusades. After Shepherd. 



Fig. 43. The Damascus population group is dependent upon irrigation. The city is a central 
point in the caravan trade of the desert of Syria. Djebel Hauran, Gilead, Moab, and the 
plateau of Judea are foci of heavier rainfall and population. The coastal fringe of poptilation 
also corresponds with a belt of heavier and more dependable rainfall. The nomad of the Syrian 
desert has always coveted the crops and raided the villages of the settled oases dwellers. See 
also Figure 45. From L'Asie Frangaise, February 1920. 



98 The New World 

(4) A protest against the creation of a Zionist state, which is con- 
sidered a grave menace to the bulk of the people. 

(5) Lebanon and Palestine not to be separated from the rest of 
Syria. 

(6) Complete independence for Mesopotamia. 

(7) The annulment of all agreements previously made by France 
and Great Britain for dividing Syria or establishing Zionism. 

A still bolder step was taken in March 1920. Another Syrian con- 
gress was held at Damascus and the independence of Syria was de- 
clared, with the Emir Feisal as King. The text of the Declaration of 
Independence adopted by the Syrian Congress is as follows : 

"The Conference declares : 

(1) The complete independence of Syria within its natural bound- 
aries, from Sinai to the Taurus, and from the Syrian desert 
to the sea, without any protectorate, mandate, or other form 
of foreign interference. 

(2) The proclamation of Emir Feisal (son of the King of Hedjaz) as 
King of Syria. 

(3) Compulsory rmhtary service. 

(4) The notification of the representatives of the European powers, 
and of the Peace Conference at Paris, of this decision." 

The matters in dispute between Great Britain and Fiance on the 

one hand and the Arabs on the other are still in process of negotiation. 

In the meantime, the aggressive attitude of Emir Feisal has led to 

French military action. In July 1920 Damascus was taken ; a heavy 

fine was levied against the city, and Feisal was driven away. 

Moslem In the summer of 1919 an American commission was sent into the 

to zioi-°'^ country to inquire into the wishes of the people of Syria and the needs 

^s™ of the country. It was found that if the people of Syria had a free 

choice, they would undoubtedly prefer Emir Feisal as ruler. They 

wish also to see Syria extended southward to include Palestine, as in 

the days of the Crusades. They certainly do not wish Palestine to 

become a Jewish state, since the Jews constitute only a little more 

than one tenth of the total population. They believe that in a 

Zionist state the Jews would secure political control and would not 

respect the holy places as impartially as would an outside, established 



Fig. 45. Relief map of Syria to serve as a reference in the study of Figures 42 and 43, which 
show respectively the historic routes and the density of population. 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 




Feet 

(approx.equiv.) 

Over 3000®!^ Over 9800 
2000-3000^SSSG&00-9800 
000-2000^3200-6500 
500-1000 CI^I600-3200 
200-500 E:13 GOO-IGOO 
0-200CZ:i O-GOO 
belowsea level 



i£ 



100 



The New World 



power, for the so-called "holy places" include places sacred to the 
Christian and to the Moslem as well as to the Jew. 

The Cathohcs of the Lebanon, as well as the Maronites, prefer French 
ownership or protection, and in using the word "Lebanon" they 
mean really a greater Lebanon outside of Syria. On the other hand, 
the Moslems wish American or British assistance, combined with 
poUtical independence. The Druses are everywhere opposed to France. 

The Lebanon was set off from Turkey in 1861 under the nominal 
protection of six European powers, with a Christian governor. The 
population is composed chiefly of Maronites, who are attached to the 
Roman CathoKc Church. After an international regime was estab- 
lished, there was an almost complete change in the conditions of life, 
military service was abohshed, the taxes were reduced, a great deal of 
wealth was accumulated, roads were built, orchards were planted. The 
population of the Lebanon is more than 200,000, or 160 to the square 
mile, while the rest of Syria has but 30 to the square mile ; about 
350,000 are Christians, about 50,000 Druses, and the small remainder 
is Mohammedan. On 1 September 1920 General Gouraud proclaimed 
the autonomy of the Lebanon. Beirut is the seat of government. 
From Palestine the district given autonomy extends northward to the 
River Kebir, which empties into the Mediterranean due west of Homs. 

The Jews have sought to include the southern Lebanon within the 
new boundaries of Palestine. To this arrangement is opposed the 
fact that the Phoenician coast shows practically no influence trace- 
able to Jewish culture and has never been under effective Jewish 
occupation. Nor was the civilization of eastern Palestine, beyond the 
trench of the Jordan and the Dead Sea, ever Jewish : it was Greek, 
Roman, Byzantine, or Christian Arab. Over it the Jew has never 
exercised control, except temporarily after conquest. 

During the World War, the British and French diplomats framed 
the so-caUed Sykes-Picot agreement, which was designed to give 
France permanent rights in Syria and to delimit French and British 
power in Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Syria. Of great importance 
for a time, this agreement has now been set aside. 

Though aU of Syria was overrun by the British troops under Gen- 
eral Allenby, it was agreed, before the task of occupation was begun, 
that mihtary success or failure should have no bearing upon the 
future pohtical control of that region. Therefore when it became 
necessary to provide a somewhat more permanent form of govern- 
ment until the Turkish treaty could be arranged, the British troops 
evacuated not only Syria but CiUcia, and their place was taken by the 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



101 




102 



The New World 



French 
position 
respect- 
ing Syria 




r-::--.| Under British administration (includes Haifa) 
^Sm „ French „ 



^ Under Italian administration 
Russian „ 



Under International administration 



Fig. 47. Division of Turkey according to (1) the Sykes-Picot agreement of May 1916 (and the 
later Italian agreement) ; (2) the secret treaty of London of 1915 as it affected the Straits Zone 
at Constantinople, the Italian sphere of influence in southern Anatolia, and the Russian sphere 
in Turkish Armenia. From maps and text in the Manchester Guardian, 8 and 10 January 1920. 
International boundaries as of 1914. 

French (November 1919). French occupation was to extend east- 
ward only as far as the Sykes-Picot hne, but it was specifically agreed 
that this arrangement in no way prejudged the question of mandates 
or boundaries to be determined in the future. 

It was agreed also that British troops should occupy Palestine up 
to the ancient boundary — that is, from Dan to Beersheba — ■ and 
Mesopotamia, including Mosul. It was further agreed that France 
should protect the Armenians; and that the cities of Damascus, 
Homs, Hama, and Aleppo were to be garrisoned by Arabs. When 
these arrangements were put into effect, Arab hostility to French occu- 
pation obliged the French to proceed against Feisal and take Damas- 
cus, as already described. The French also seized Aleppo and thus 
held the gateways to the desert. 

The French insisted that the basis of any new plans for the disposi- 
tion of Syria should be the Sykes-Picot agreement. This meant 
that they could not see Mosul and Palestine go to Great Britain or to 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



103 



any other power, unless France got concessions in return. France 
also insisted that she should have the same status and relations with 
the Arabs of Syria that England had with the Arabs in Mesopotamia. 

The Syrian situation had been further comphcated by the creation French op- 
of the kingdom of Hedjaz in 1915. Through Emir Feisal and his ESpeild 
father, King Hussein, special agreements had been made between 
Great Britain and the Arabs, and the Emir long received a large 
monthly subsidy from the British government. France did not wish 
to be bound by any of these British- Arab agreements, all of which lent 
support to the idea of Arab independence. 

By the Sykes-Picot agreement the eastern boundary of the Syrian 
region lay west of the Damascus-Medina railroad ; this would have 
permitted France to hold only the coastal portion of a broad group of 
regions, and France wished to control the interior pastures, farms, and 
cities of Syria from Aleppo to Damascus and beyond. France insisted on 
the frontiers of 1916, with rectifications based on geographic and ethno- 
graphic grounds. She also sought concessions at Mosul for petroleum 
and pipe fines, claiming these on terms of equality with British oil 




Fig. 48. The tripartite agreement between Great Britain, France, and Italy (10 August 1920) 
regarding equahty of commercial privileges in the respective spheres of influence of the signatory 
powers. This agreement displaces the provisions of the secret treaty of London of 1915, the 
Sykes-Picot agreement, and certain other special agreements and promises. By its terms Italy 
gains recognition of her special interests in Zone C, and France in Zone D ; the three powers 
give each other diplomatic support in their respective spheres ; provision is made for the capital- 
ization on terms of equality by British, French, and Itahan bankers of the Bagdad railway and 
other lines; the coal basin of Heraclea (on the north coast of Anatolia, east of the Bosporus) is 
to be exploited by Italy with French and British reservations. On the map, A represents the 
southern, or Asiatic, part of the Zone of the Straits, B represents the Greek zone at Smyrna 
(Fig. 161), and E represents Syria. 



104 The New World 

interests in Mesopotamia and Kurdistan, as France is in great need 
of petroleum in her home territory. Matters were finally settled when 
France reUnquished claims upon Mosul, where her sole interest was 
petroleum, in return for the privilege of getting one fourth of the oil 
that Great Britain secures in Mesopotamia. This was good policy 
for Great Britain, because it gave her unrestricted control of the Tigris 
and easier access to central and western Kurdistan. France also 
grants to the British the right to build oil pipe fines to the Medi- 
terranean, across the French sphere of influence in Syria, in return 
for the privilege of buying one fourth of the oil that may be piped in 
this way from Persia. 
Pres- There can be fit tie hope that a greater or united Syria will be 

ent possi- established, owing principaUy to the unwillingness of Great Britain 

bilities of a • ^ ^ o ^ • • 1 P -T 

united and France to withdraw irom theu* respective spheres ot military 

^^* occupation. Yet if Syria should break up into smaU units, the effect 

would unquestionably be to perpetuate the old religious differences. 
This is one of those rare times when men's minds and plans are in a 
state of change, a time of political experiment. Some statesmen think 
that before new habits of intrigue and religious rivalry are formed, it 
would be weU to make a united state out of these diverse refigious 
and racial elements — one in which refigious hatreds would become 
lessened in the common thought that men would give to political 
experimentation and a new economic life. 

The Arabs of the desert wish to hold the settled coastal strip, but 
there is one clear historical argument against such an arrangement : 
the desert Arab has never long held or effectively governed the 
people of the settled lands. There are strong ethnic reasons also. 
We commonly think that the pure-bred Arab nomads of the desert 
typify the Arabian population. But they have fittle in common with 
the Arabs settled on farms or in towns, as in Mesopotamia and Syria, 
In addition there is considerable variation among the Arabs in the 
matter of racial purity. Those in Syria have become modified in part 
by invading stocks ; those of the Yemen have probably as much east 
African as Semitic blood in their veins. 

Many political writers see only selfish aims in the efforts of the 
strong powers to maintain themselves in some of the most important 
localities in the world. But one thing is tied to another politicaUy 
in such a way that many motives, rather than one, control the ac- 
tions of the powers. Hedjaz could not rule Syria. It is far away ; 
the new kingdom is poor and weak ; and the leaders on whom the 
King of the Hedjaz could caU for help are few in number and quite 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 105 

without the necessary experience. The business of governing is not 
simple ; it is difficult and costly. Left to themselves, the people of 
backward countries become the prey of strong and selfish nations, or 
create disorder, or join with other weak people and make first poUti- 
cal and then military trouble for neighboring nations. 

FRENCH INTERESTS IN NORTHERN AFRICA 

Morocco 

French popular interest in northern Africa has long been keen, 
and the economic development of the region has been steadily pro- 
moted. Morocco is first in importance and is of international interest 
because it in part controls access to the Mediterranean. The country 
is divided into three zones (Fig. 50) : 

(1) Tangier, under international control. 

(2) The narrow Spanish Zone, south of Tangier. 

(3) The French Protectorate, including most of Morocco. 

By international agreement Tangier has been administered by unsatis- 
the resident diplomatic corps. It is probably the most instructive JaJ^^of 
example of the difficulties and penalties of joint "government of a town Tangier 
by representatives of the great powers. Until it is put into the 
hands of a single power, or until the authority now exercised by 
different men is consohdated in the hands of a single administrator, 
the people of Tangier will be subject to unjust treatment and the com- 
mercial possibilities of the region wiU not be developed. The trouble 
dates back to 1856, when, by the terms of the British- Moroccan treaty 
of that year (later supplemented by the Spanish-Moroccan treaty of 
1861), a "system of capitulations" was established, which has lasted 
down to the present day and which exists in modified form in the 
Spanish Zone as well as in the area of the French Protectorate. In 
1880 the capitulations were codified, and any benefits under them were 
to be equally enjoyed by the subjects of all foreign powers. In 1904 
England and France exchanged forms of recognition, the one declaring 
that she abandoned aU political interests in Morocco, the other making 
a similar declaration respecting claims in Egypt. Each nation, further- 
more, undertook to support the other's pohcy. 

In the same year France and Spain came to terms as to their spheres 
of influence in Morocco, and this date (1904) therefore marks the 
beginning of the division of Morocco into three distinct spheres^ 



100 



The New World 




Fig. 49. French possessions in Africa. The dotted areas were acquired before 1914 ; the cross- 
lined areas are under French mandate. Two small areas north and south of Ghat in Libya were 
ceded to Italy by France in 1919 in pursuance of that article of the secret treaty of London, 
1915, which stipulated that Italy was to have grants of territory in Africa from both France and 
Great Britain provided these two powers gained territory in that continent. Great Britain made 
similar frontier adjustments on behalf of Italy in Libya and Somaliland (Fig. 74). The map 
also shows existing and proposed railways in French Africa. Most interesting are : (1) the trans- 
Saharan projects, which would link North Africa with British South Africa and the Guinea region ; 
(2) the coast project from Morocco to Dakar, which, if connected with the Spanish system by a 
Gibraltar tunnel, would cut the time from Paris to South America by nearly a week. 



— Tangier, the Spanish Zone, and the French Protectorate, — though 
the treaty with Morocco providing for the French Protectorate was 
not signed until 1912. France's treaty of 1912 was signed with the 
Sultan, Mulai Hafid. It was the outerowth of difficulties with Ger- 
many, following the conference of Algeciras in 1906, and especially 



rocco 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 107 

of the threat of war in 1911 in connection with the events at 
Agadir.^ 

It was also in 1912 that the French and Spanish came to an agree- French 
ment on the limits of their respective spheres. Since then, efforts Jion^fiJ[ 
have been made to frame a rational government for Tangier, but they extension 
have so far failed. The diplomatic agents of the various powers power 
are also the judges in the courts, and citizens of each of the powers 
have extraterritorial rights, because it is impossible for a foreigner to 
enjoy security of life or property under a Moroccan administration. 
The Sultans of Morocco have delegated to the foreign represen- 
tatives matters of trade, public health, and general administration, 
and this fact has still further complicated life for the native. Public 
works are neglected ; the population continues to suffer from a short- 
age of water ; commercial efforts are not organized ; social legisla- 
tion is practically unknown. 

So much the greater part of Morocco Hes in the French portion The present 
that the administration of the whole region may fairly be considered the*Fre°nch 
as a French problem, in spite of the other foreign interests. The ^^ ^°- 
population of French Morocco is between 5,000,000 and 6,000,000, and 
the area is 220,000 square miles. If the arid lands were irrigated, 
forests protected and replanted, and the locust plagues controlled, the 
population might be increased as much as 500 per cent. 

To control Morocco might today be easier were it not that for a long and 
several centuries the descendants of the Moors expelled from Spain 
have been spreading fanatical hatred of the European; and until 
recently, when the French began effective intervention, they defeated 
every effort to hold their land in European subjection. The long 
contest between Moors and Europeans is marked by more than one 
historic episode. One of the decisive battles in world history was 
that of Kasr-al-Kabir in 1578, when the Portuguese king and army 
suffered a terrible defeat with the most destructive consequences upon 
Portugal's future colonial history. For a few years (1661-1684) the 
British held Tangier, but eventually were forced to evacuate it. 

Within the past fifty years France has intervened more and more 
often in Moroccan affairs. She has governed with rare ability, 

' The Agadir crisis took place in 1911, when the German gunboat Panther was dispatched 
to the port of Agadir in Morocco, ostensibly to protect the commercial interests and the lives 
of German nationals, but really to check the French policy of expansion in Africa. At the 
moment of the crisis unexpected sympathy developed between France and England, and 
Germany was obliged to withdraw her demands under cover of the grant by France of ex- 
tensive territory in French Equatorial Africa on the southern and eastern borders of the 
Cameroons. 



bitter con- 
test 



108 



The New World 




Fig. 50. Note the location and number of French military posts. From map in Annalcs de 

Giographie, January 1917. 



New inter- 
national 
agreements 
respecting 
Morocco 



though she would find her problem much easier if she could get rid 
of the Spanish Zone, which is a refuge of brigands and political 
agitators. This she cannot do, for Spain considers her Moroccan 
territory of special political value, possibly of ultimate commercial 
value, and will not relinquish it (page 151). 

The French government has declared the policy of the open door in 
Morocco, which guarantees commercial and industrial equaUty to all 
the Allied nations. The attitude of the French government is based 
upon the willingness of the Alhed nations to surrender all special priv- 
ileges of an international character which they formerly enjoyed. That 
is, the Moroccan people and rulers are not under special obhgation 
to any nation other than France ; all outstanding obligations to other 
nations are canceled. German interests in Morocco have long been 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



109 




110 



The New World 



French 
supervision 
over Mo- 
roccan gov- 
ernment 
affairs 



French de- 
velopment 
of ports, 
roads, and 
a good 
civil ad- 
ministra- 
tion 



Agriculture 
and for- 
estry en- 
couraged 



of little consequence ; but Germany pressed her claims upon every 
occasion, not because she hoped to control Morocco, where the French 
and Spanish interests had been longer established than her own, but 
because she wished to have a pawn in disputes with France elsewhere, 
as in Equatorial Africa (page 107). The treaty of Versailles carries a 
provision requiring Germany to abandon £dl rights and privileges 
granted by the General Act of Algeciras of April 1900 and the Franco- 
German agreements of February 1909 and November 1911. Ger- 
many further renounces all treaties and agreements between herself 
and the Moroccan Emph'e, abandons the regime of the capitulations 
(caiTying servitudes in favor of European nations, including herself), 
and gives up aU mining rights. 

l^efore the period of Eiu-opean intervention that began about 
1875, the SiUtan of Morocco had absolute power, both political and 
religious, and his innnediate officers controlled all the affairs of the 
comitry. The French have continued this form of government, ex- 
cept that the French resident-general has become a kind of minister 
of foreign affairs. The French have also added such departments 
as those of public works, public lands, finance, agriculture, and postal 
service. Thus France exercises supervisory power over the somces of 
production and the means of exchange. 

Through her intelligence officers and her military and civil ad- 
ministrators, France has conducted her relations with the natives 
in the most delicate manner and with fine respect for the native cus- 
toms, though sufficiently firm in cariy^ing out the pacification of un- 
settled regions. In short, she has extended the best of her policies 
in Tunis and Algeria throughout all IMorocco. She has developed 
the ports of Morocco, not only Casablanca as the major port, but also 
local ports hke Kenitra and INlogador. In the matter of railroad 
building France was handicapped by the agreement of 1911, which 
required construction of the international Tangier- Fez line — ^on 
which work has only recently begun — to take precedence over other 
lines. Several narrow-gauge lines have beeu constructed, hoAvever, 
and an impetus has been given to road building. More than twelve 
hundred miles of metaled roads are open to traffic, and about the same 
mileage of other roads. 

Agricidture has been encouraged by teaching the native Moroccan 
the advantages of modem methods and the use of agricultural ma- 
chinery. Agricultural experiment stations have been established. 
Stock breeding has been taught in order to improve the strain of 
sheep, cattle, horses, and mules. The French have taken strong 



Folitioal and Colonial Aims of France 



111 




Fig. 52. Casablanca, one of the seaports of Morocco. An airplane photograph showing the 
Place do France and the European quarter. From the Geographical Review, 1919. 

measures for the protection of both the cork-oak forests of the 
littoral and the beautiful cedar forests of the Middle Atlas. 



Algeria 

Including the Saliaran district administered with it, Algeria has nearly 
a million square miles, or four times the area of France; but it is 
only the coastal belts that are of present economic importance (Fig. 55). 
It is divided into four physiographic zones which run parallel to the 
Mediterranean coast : 

(1) The Little Atlas, or maritime, mountain and valley belt called Physio- 
the Tell. g™phic 

divisions of 

(2) The intermediate plateau of the Shat, marked by failing streams *^® country 
and salt lakes. 

(3) The Great, or Saharan, Atlas range, with peaks that exceed six 
thousand feet in height. 

(4) A second interior piedmont belt with intermittent streams, 
broad mud and salt flats, and the gravelly and sandy wastes 
of the northern Sahara. 

The people are distributed chiefly in the coastal belt and in scat- 
tered oases in the interior. Their lot has been made easier in places 



112 



The New World 




Figs. 53 and 54. The old and the new in Moroccan agriculture. To the primitive plow are 
harnessed any available animals — and even women. "It is not unusual to see a camel, an 
ass, and a woman drawing the plow," says Bernard iLe Maroc, 1913, p. 170). The introduc- 
tion of modern agricultural machinery is, however, beginning to transform Moroccan agriculture. 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



113 



by the good results of French irrigation, which has involved the 
building of two large water-storage basins. 

French control in Algeria dates from 1830, when the occupation of 
several coast towns was carried out and negotiations with native 
chieftains were begun. The effect of French occupation has been 
to stabilize the social and business life of the people, remove the con- 
trol of military chiefs who ran the country under nominal Turkish 
sovereignty, and put an end to depredations upon Mediterranean 
commerce by the Barbary pirates. 

These results France was able to acliieve only after a long struggle, incidents of 
There was practically continuous native opposition to her control control 
from 1830 to 1847. Again in 1851, 1864-1871, and 1881, insurrec- *'°°'° 
tions were put down. From that time on the country was sufficiently 
quiet to enable the French to press inland step by step, until by 1905 
their control of Algeria was extended also over the whole desert 
interior. It is interesting to note that by the treaty of Sevres 
Turkey is to recognize the French protectorate in Morocco as of 
1912, and in Tunis as of 1881, thus confirming French occupation of 
northern Africa from Libya westward to the Atlantic, except Tangier 
and the northern Spanish Zone. 

There are about 4,750,000 native inhabitants in Algeria and in 
addition 30,000 non-European whites and 750,000 Europeans (chiefly 
French and Spaniards). Berbers form three fourths of the total 
population. The present tendency is toward a decline of the Euro- 
pean population, in spite of port improvements, the construction of 
several thousand miles of railway, and the building of an equal mile- 




FiG. 65. Generalized reKef belts of Algeria and Tunis. Forests from M. Marc, Notes sur les 

forets de I'Algerie, 1916. 



114 



The New World 



Decline of 
European 
population 



Importance 
of Algerian 
products in 
French 
trade 



age of first-class roads, besides telegraph lines aiid other modern 
facilities of commerce. 

The decline of European population is in p£U"t due to a bad system 
of land tenure. Boundaries are ill defined, titles are insecure, and 
much of the land is held in common by individual tribes. Though 
the French, authorities have delimited many tribal boundaries and 
passed laws permitting the sale of family as opposed to tribal prop- 
erty in land, the tribesmen have not responded to the opportunity, 
chiefly because they saw the demoralizing efl'ects upon families that, 
having sold their land, dissipated the proceeds and fell into a state of 
poverty. Those French colonists who have purchased state lands, 
hitherto unoccupied, have been compelled to live for a term of five 
years upon their holdings, and this obligation has further diminished 
the zeal of intending colonists. 

The land of Algeria is capable of high production. The hilly 
maritime belt (fifty to one hundred miles wide), known as the Tell, 
grows cereals — chiefly wheat, barley, and oats — ^in abundajice, es- 
pecially since the increase of water supply brought about by the 
drilling of artesian wells. Olives, tobacco, and wine are produced 
in nearly all the cultivated oases of the interior valleys. Nearly a 
half-million acres are devoted to the production of grapes for wine. 

A review of these and other exports of Algeria, like horses, sheep, 
oxen, wool and skins, fruits and oils, and a consideration of their total 
value, — which with imports now exceeds $250,000,000 annually, — 
will show the practical basis of French interest in the territory. 
The products are such as France needs to supplement her own re- 
sources and to feed her industries. To reap the highest advantage, 
the French government requires Algerian overseas coimnerce to be 
carried wholly in French ships. 



Plan 

of govern- 
ment under 
Turkish 
rule 



Tunis 

Under Turkish rule and before the French occupation, Tunis was 
divided into sixty administrative districts with a total extent of 42,000 
square miles and a population of 2,100,000. At the head of each dis- 
trict was a caid, or ruler. He was assisted by caliphs, who governed 
the smaller administrative divisions, and by sheikhs, who ruled the 
individual towns and villages. There were more than thirteen 
hundred sheikhates in Tunisia at the time of the French occupation 
in 1881. 

The French in general retained the old system, except that they 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



115 




116 



The New World 



Changes 
introduced 
by the 
French 

Semi- 
nomadic 
tribes of 
Tunis 



Unruly 
spirit of the 
Tunisian 
tribes 




Fig. 57. Oasis in the gorge of Kantara, Algeria, located in the Maritime Atlas (Fig. 55). 

divided the country into territorial divisions, rather than ac- 
cording to tribes, and themselves reserved the privilege of appoint- 
ing the tribal chiefs, or caids. 

The various tribes of Tunis numbered from a few hundred to many 
thousands in each district. Originally they were practically all semi- 
nomadic, and some of them were whoUy so. Wherever there was 
good pasture, there they grazed their herds and flocks, and the size 
of the tribe was largely controlled by the size of the pasture, the 
nearness of towns or the sea coast, and their mihtary strength, the 
purely nomadic tribes preying upon passing caravans or upon more 
settled people in the towns of the oases. 

The French occupation was largely to prevent raids of the Khroumer 
tribes on Algeria. There was a great deal of trouble in 1881 and also 
in 1887, but since then these tribes have devoted themselves more 
steadily to cattle-raising and agriculture. They number probably 
about 7000. Some Tunisian tribes, such as the Drid and the Ouerten, 
composed of hard-working people who raise cereals, cattle, and sheep, 
have submitted peacefully to French occupation; others, like the 
Chaihia, have never become reconciled to it, and are ready for revolt 
at almost any time. Some of them were extremely unruly during 
the Turkish occupation, as for example the Souassi, who at one time 



Political and Colonial Aims of France 



117 




jm 




FiQ. 58. Scene in the desert interior of French Algeria. Photo by Gautier in the Geographical 

Review, January 1921. 




Fig. 59. In the northern sand dune belt of the French Sahara. 



Brown Bros. 



118 The New World 

were obliged to flee into Tripoli, but returned to Tunis as a result 
of famine. They number about 37,000 and at present are engaged 
in agriculture. The Neffet, who are warlike and fanatical, have 
more than once revolted against the Turkish government. They are 
occupied chiefly as shepherds, but own some palm groves in the oasis 
of Gabes (Fig. 55). 
The native In the Ncfzaoua district there are nearly fifty villages scattered 

wflv of life 

among the oases and surrounded by sandy soil and sand dunes. The 
population is engaged in the cultivation of date palms and numbers 
about 10,000. Formerly the villages bought protection from nomad 
raids ; but with French occupation and the pacification of the wild 
frontier tribes this is no longer necessary. 

A large number of the tribes of Tunis live in a confederation called 
Overghemma. They are supposed to number nearly 50,000. Some 
of these have fixed dweUings; others are nomads. For a time 
after the French occupation they kept the border districts in a con- 
stant state of turmoil ; but gradually they were driven out or sub- 
dued, and the frontier regions are now kept in order by a string of 
fortified posts. 

Difiiculties of administration over these people have been most 
admirably met by France. Tunisia, indeed, is often held out as a 
model in this respect. In the present state of the country and the 
future prospects there is promise of reward to France for the drain 
upon her military and economic resources entailed by occupation and 
pacification. 



CHAPTER FOUR 

BELGIUM AS A EUROPEAN FOCUS 

Throughout recorded history Belgium has been a battle ground Belgium as 
of rival tribes and nations. As early as the middle of the 17th century ^^^°' 
she had been called "the military arena of Europe" — and since battle 
that time she has continued well to deserve the name. For more ^^^^"^ 
than two hundred years previous to the War of the Spanish Succes- 
sion (1702-1713), Belgium was ruled by the Spanish Hapsbargs. As 
a result of that war she was handed over to the Austrian Hapsburgs, 
the dynasty which continued to rule Austria-Hungary until that coun- 
try surrendered to the Allies in November 1918. In 1792 an army 
was sent by France, then in the midst of her great Revolution, os- 
tensibly to free Belgium from Austrian rule ; but before long Belgium 
found herself annexed to France, and French domination continued 
until 1814. 

At the Congress of Vienna in 1815 the wishes of the Belgian people winning 
were again ignored; for instead of becoming independent, Belgium pen^tnce 
was joined to Holland to form the Kingdom of the Netherlands, in 
order to improve the defenses against France. But there were dif- 
ferences of language, religion, and economic interests between the 
two peoples that could not be reconciled after a separation of one 
hundred and thirty-five years, especially as the Dutch took care to 
enforce the use of the Dutch language and to occupy the best offices 
of the government. In 1830, when the news reached Belgium that 
Charles X, the Bourbon king of France, had been deposed by his 
subjects, the country was profoundly stirred. Petitions were sent 
to William I, king of the Netherlands, asking for the administra- 
tive separation of HoUand and Belgium. WiUiam replied by send- 
ing an army to put down the ensuing disorders, whereupon Belgium 
declared and won her independence. Her final status, however, 
was not settled until 1839, when Holland accepted the treaty of Lon- 
don, which, in 1831, had established Belgium as "an independent and 
perpetually neutral state." This was the treaty which was broken 
by Germany when she invaded Belgium in August 1914. 

Thus the World War saw Belgium affected by only the latest and The dissi- 
most grievous of a long succession of servitudes and disasters. The Jumrn"^ 
reason for her melancholy history is clear : she stands upon the great energy on 
world highway that joins central and western Europe. She has fiews^of^ 
suffered, not because of her own ambitions, but because of the ambi- Fi^i^ders 

119 



T20 



The New World 



Growth of 
industrial 
power 



POPULATION DENSITY 

. persq km per sq mile 
~/y T \~Zy^ under 25 IZZl under 64 
U / |<i~/ 25-75 I 164-192 
75-150 CI] 192-384 
over 1 50 Clover 384 




Fig. 60. The two converging belts of densest population in Europe, mth Belgium at the meet- 
ing place. Cities with a population exceeding 500,000 have their names spelled in full ; those 
with a population less than 500,000 are indicated by initials only. Based on Andrce, Handatlas, 
Sheet 31. 

tions of others Avho have struggled for supremacy on her soil. Her 
shattered hopes have been the evidence of her neighbors' greed. It 
would be difficult to measure the human energy that has been dissi- 
pated and perverted upon the fields of Flanders; it is imperative 
that means be devised for preventing a recurrence of so terrible an 
expenditure. 

If the position of Belgium has brought her tragic consequences 
in times of war, it has nevertheless given her prosperity in times of 
peace. During the 19th century, and in spite of her small size, Bel- 
gium became a great industrial nation. In 1910 her population 
(7,500,000, or more than 650 to the square mile) was comparable 
to that of Pennsylvania, whose area is four times as great. She was 
the tliird greatest industrial nation of the continent, mined consider- 
able coal of her own, and had other valuable mineral resources, al- 
though her iron supply was wholly insuLfficient for her needs. 



Present 
handicaps 



THE TASK OF REBUILDING 



The German occupation and the general effects of the war require 
that the industries of Belgium be rebuilt from their foundations. It 
is estimated that from 1914 to 1918 the country suffered damages 
totaUng $7,600,000,000. Although she will receive 8 per cent of the 



Belgium as a European Focus 



121 




Fig. 61. Comparison of the European theaters of war a hundred years ago and today. 
Napoleonic Wars are taken from Putzger, Hisiorische Schul-Atlas. 




FiQ. 62. Modern defenses in a historical field of conflict. Note the chain of German defenses 
on the Rhine, the belt of forts close to the French frontier, and the great forts of the interven- 
ing country, — Strasbourg, Metz, Namur, Liege, and Antwerp. There is a large industrial 
population between Paris and the northeastern frontier (Fig. 33). A dense industrial popula- 
tion also occupies the frontier zone of Germany on both sides of the Rhine. From map en- 
titled Guerre Europeenne, 1914, 1 : 1,200,000. 



122 



The New World 



The work 
of restora- 
tion 



Revival of 
industry 



Flemish- 
Walloon 
problem 



German indemnity, the amount of -indemnity that the AUies can 
collect is wholly uncertain. In addition Belgium is to receive re- 
imbursement from Germany for all sums (about five billion francs) 
borrowed by Belgium from the Allied and Associated Powers during 
the war, with interest at 5 per cent. 

The recovery of Belgium has been extraordinarily rapid. Within 
a year of the time of the armistice (11 November 1918), almost 
the whole Belgian railway system was restored to full activity, 
and this in spite of labor difficulties and the lack of building ma- 
terial. Likewise the road system, of which a thousand miles had 
been damaged or destroyed, had been restored and the canals 
had been cleared, putting Belgium again in possession of aU her 
means of communication. In a few years Belgium may be ex- 
pected to recover her place among the industrial nations of the 
world. 

The spirit of unrest prevailing in Belgium at the close of the war 
soon subsided. Crop production was raised in less than two years 
to the pre-war level, and the country was started upon a program of 
real economic revival. By the end of 1920 Belgium's industries were 
producing 80 per cent as much as before the war. Glass manufactures 
recovered to the extent of 98 per cent. In Ghent, half the cotton 
factories were in operation. In 1919 there were produced 18,500,000 
tons of coal. That the iron and steel industries show only 18 per cent 
of pre-war output is because nearly all the mills were dismantled dur- 
ing the German occupation. By the terms of the armistice and the 
peace treaty, Germany was required to return a large part of the ma- 
chinery taken from Belgium. 

In addition to the other difficulties there is a vexatious language 
problem at home, and, across the border, misunderstanding with Hol- 
land. A little more than half the people of Belgium are Flemish, and 
quite closely resemble the Dutch ; the rest are Walloons, and speak 
French (Fig. 63). The Flemings have kept their old indigenous 
language, as well as French, though practicing a certain amount of 
exclusion toward the latter. As Catholics they are opposed to the 
religious hberalism that the Walloons have imported from France. 
The Walloons have had a preponderance of power in the past, though 
the Flemings in recent years have slowly been gaining a status of their 
own. While the Germans were in Belgium, they tried in all possible 
ways to foster a separatist movement, and even promised the Flem- 
ings to guarantee their independence. But the Flemish people re- 
mained loyal to the idea of national unity. 



II 



Belgium as a European Focus 



123 




Fig. 63. The shaded areas represent the districts in Holland which Belgium would like to 
have. Possession of the one on the left would permit Belgium to improve the Scheldt and 
thus remove long-standing restrictions on the growth of Antwerp; possession of southern 
Limburg would increase the defensive strength of Belgium's eastern frontier. The Flemish- 
Walloon speech boundary is after Vidal Lablache. 



BELGIAN CLAIMS TO ADJACENT TERRITORY 

Belgium's misunderstandings with Holland arise out of her claims Limburg 
to Dutch Limburg and to the left bank of the lower Scheldt (Fig. 63). «i"estion 
The Limburg region is inhabited by Dutch people and was given to Hol- 
land by the powers in 1839, greatly to the dissatisfaction of Belgium. 
Belgium would now hke to have it back, chiefly on account of (1) its 
coal deposits, (2) its strategic value in the military defense of the 
country, and (3) its relation to the eastern water transportation routes. 
With the coveted strip in her hands, she could connect the Meuse 
and the Rhine by canal. This is an almost vital matter in a country 
having the densest population in Europe and the highest per capita 
mileage of railways and canals. Belgium feels that Holland cannot 
defend the region in time of Avar and calls attention to the fact that Ger- 
man troops retreating into Germany after the armistice of November 
1918 crossed Dutch territory, thus violating the neutrality of Hol- 
land. Under the treaty of Versailles, however, Germany is not 
allowed to maintain armed forces in the region known as the Left 
Bank of the Rhine, and Belgium is therefore fuUy protected against 
a sudden attack from this side. 

As for the problem of the Scheldt, Belgium claims that the growth Belgium's 
of her great port, Antwerp (on the Scheldt, 50 miles from its mouth), is ^^^""^ *° 
largely at the mercy of Holland, which controls both banks of the river troi of the 
for a distance of 40 miles. By the treaty of 1839, regulations regard- ®*^^^^^* 
ing pilotage, buoying, and dredging of this river must have the joint 
consent of Holland and Belgium. Holland, however, has prevented 
or delayed improvements of the river in order that Rotterdam might 



124 



The New World 



Relations 

with 

Luxemburg 



profit at the expense of Antwerp. The negotiations between Bel- 
gium and Holland had for their object a guarantee to Belgium of the 
full use of the river in time of peace and of its improvement to meet 
Antwerp's growing needs ; but Holland refused to yield, and no im- 
provement of Belgium's status on the Scheldt was secured. The 
left bank of the Scheldt in Dutch possession covers an area of 275 
square miles and has a population of about 80,000, practically all of 
whom are Dutch. 

Belgium has always wished to regain possession of the grand duchy 
of Luxemburg, for it was a part of Belgium, or the Southern Nether- 
lands, until the French Revolution. In 1839 the western, or Walloon, 
portion was assigned to Belgium and the eastern, or German, portion 
became the grand duchy of Luxemburg as we know it today. Though 
its neutrality had been guaranteed in 1867, the duchy was occupied by 
Germany throughout the World War. Ever since 1842 it had been a 
member of the German Customs Union, and its railroads have been 
under German control. Both of these conditions are now set aside by 
treaty. The country is rich in iron and has some coal. France, to 
which the upper classes of the duchy have been very partial, has also 
been interested in the possession of Luxemburg. A plebiscite held on 
28 September 1919 favored a customs union with France and a con- 
tinuation of the rule of the reigning family. The grand duchy is a 
little smaller than Rhode Island, having an area of 1000 square miles, 
and it has about 250,000 inhabitants. 



Territorial 
gains in 
Europe 
and Africa 



EUROPEAN AND COLONIAL ACQUISITIONS . 

Belgium's territorial gains as a result of the war are very small. 
They include the following : 

(1) Small additions of territory along the German frontier, in the 
Eupen, Malmedy, and Moresnet regions, with an area of 382 
square miles and a population of 64,000 (Fig. 64). 

(2) Ruanda and Urundi, a minor but agriculturally valuable part 
of former German East Africa (see Figure 65 and also page 

125). 

The additions on her eastern frontier were made in order to 
strengthen Belgium from a military standpoint. In 1839 the defensive 
strength of her frontiers was not thought a matter of great importance ; 
but the invasion of Belgium by Germany, one of the powers that had 
guaranteed her neutrahty, made it clear that the country is not safe 
as a neutral and must be given the means of defending herself in case 



Belgium as a European Focus 



U5 



of attack. Before the war Ger- 
many had built mihtary railways 
leading to the border and along it 
that were a menace to Belgium's 
peace. One of Germany's famous 
concentration camps was at El- 
senborn, near the Belgian border. 
Strong dissatisfaction was ex- 
pressed in Germany with the terms 
of the treaty of Versailles that 
provided for the disposition of 
the Eupen and Malmedy districts. 
Under Belgian supervision, all 
voters were permitted to express 
a preference for German owner- 
ship, but because voting took the 
form of signing an open register, 
the arrangement prevented the 
free expression of opinion. Only 




Fig. 64. The "circles," or administrative dis- 
tricts, of Eupen and Malmedy, which Belgium 
a few hundred persons registered a gained in 1920 by the terms of the treaty of 

Versailles- With these two industrial districts 
there was included, by treaty, the small tract 
of Moresnet which had been overlooked in the 
treaty of 1815 and was thereafter subject to 
international administration. The delimitation 
of the exact boundaries had not been completed 
by the boundary commission down to the end 
of 1920. 



desire to have the districts return 
to Germany. %. 

The Ruanda and Urundi dis- 
tricts in eastern Africa were as- 
signed to Belgium in return for the 
help given by the Belgians in the 

campaign for the conquest of German East Africa (1917). Belgium 
is to act as mandatary of the League of Nations. In ceding the two 
districts, Great Britain reserved small portions on the eastern side in 
order to have a practicable route for a railroad which shall join Tan- 
ganyika Territory (as former German East Africa is now designated) 
to Uganda.^ This portion of the line is a link in the Cape-to-Cairo 
railroad (Fig. 15). In return for these important concessions to the 
British, Belgium obtains valuable economic advantages, as follows : 

(1) A i free outlet for the produce of the east-central portion of the African 
Belgian Congo by way of Lake Tanganyika to Dar es Salaam 
on the Indian Ocean. 

(2) Concession areas at Kigoma (on Lake' Tanganyika) and Dar es 
Salaam on the eastern coast for the storage of goods. 

(3) The right to transport merchandise from Lake Tanganyika 
to the Indian Ocean in Belgian freight cars. 



concessions 
to Belgium 



126 



The New World 




Fig. 65. The northwestern corner of former German East Africa, allotted to Belgium. It 
is densely populated and has a considerable extent of upland suitable for white settlement (Fig. 
263). The part ceded to Belgium (districts of Ruanda and Urundi) has an area of 18,000 square 
miles and a population estimated at 3,500,000, or about half the total of former German East 
Africa. Agriculture and grazing are the chief native occupations. 

Belgium thus gains in former German East Africa 18,000 square 
miles of territory of great economic value, to be added to the 1,000,000 
square miles she already possesses in the Belgian Congo. Ruanda 
and Urundi are high plateau regions, the former culminating in the 
volcanic mountains northeast of Lake Kivu, the latter bordering on 
Lake Tanganyika. While climatically suitable for a white man's 
country, the territory has a dense native population, intelligent and 
independent. The soil is fertile and native agriculture is well devel- 
oped ; it is one of the most important cattle regions in Africa. Its 
mineral wealth is still unexplored. 



Belgium as a European Focus 



127 



THE BELGIAN CONGO 

The economic value of the Belgian Congo is still unreaUzed. Most Vaiue of 
of the territory lies far inland, and this location has imposed a handi- congo ^'*° 
cap upon both settlement and trade. The white, or European, popu- 
lation numbers only about 6000 persons ; of these 3000 are Belgians, 
more than two thirds of them officials. The region is in great need 
of white colonists, chiefly planters and traders ; and it needs capital 
to develop its resources. Its native population is variously estimated 
at from 7 to 15 millions, chiefly negroes in a low state of social and 
economic development. 

Taken as a whole, the colony now involves the home government 
in little expense over revenues, which have been greatly increased 
through an improved but still unsatisfactory census that extended 
the application of the native tax. Cotton planting is done on a grow- 
ing scale and has only begun to be developed in large regions favorable 
to very extensive production. The chief item of export is copper. 
Palm oil and rubber also figure in the export list. Katanga, the 
comparatively healthy upland rim of the basin in the southeast, is 
highly mineralized. The copper deposits are known to be among 
the largest in the world ; already copper is exported to the amount 




Fig. 66. Rail and water transportation in the Belgian Congo. Railroads from 1 : 2,000,000 
map of Africa ; data on navigability of rivers from G. Kaeckenbeeck, International Rivers, Pub- 
lications of the Grotius Society, I, 1918. 



128 The New World 

of 27,000 tons, and the export of tin has begun. Diamonds (in the 
Vasai basin) and gold (in Welle) are other exploited mineral 
resources. 

The state-built roads now aggregate more than 6500 miles in 
length. More than 1200 miles of railway have also been built, the 
existing roads being as follows : 

Matadi-Leopoldville 240 miles 

Stanleyville-PonthierviUe 75 miles 

EJndu-Kongolo 150 miles 

Kabalo- Albert ville 165 miles 

Katanga Railway (completed to Bukama) 435 miles 

Mayumba Railway 84 nailes 

These are supplemented by a water-transport system of many 
thousands of miles and by a series of wireless stations, at Boma, 
Stanleyville, Albertville, Kilo, Kindu, etc., which hnk the coast with 
the more important inland towns. 



CHAPTER FIVE 



THE ITALIAN SITUATION 

No one of the other powers aUied against Germany in the World War 
has come out of the struggle with so many threatening internal and 
external questions and so httle increase of national territory in pro- 
portion to area, population, national debt, and war effort as Italy. 
The internal difficulties were bound to come ; the external problems 
are chiefly of her own making. 




I ^*f^ ^^ ^^^*' *^*^® ^^ ^^^^® ^^ *^® ^^^ England states and contains five times as many 
people. Only a few districts in the United States have a density of agricultural population as 
great as the cross-lined areas on the map above. From Agostini, Atlariie geografico metodico, 
6a ed., 1913. The line of the treaty of London, 1915, is shown by heavy dashes on the eastern 
border of the Adriatic. By the treaty of Rapallo between Italy and Jugo-Slavia, signed in 
November 1920, this line has been modified to form an international boundary, after a dispute 
that lasted for two years and frequently threatened war, owing to D'Annunzio's seizure of Fiume. 
See pages 259-270 for a discussion of the Adriatic question and a map of the new boundary 
(Fig. 138). The total Italian gains in Europe as a result of the war embrace an area of 8900 
square miles and a population of 1,600,000. 

129 



130 



The New World 




Fig. 68. The harbor of Trieste, western side of the Istrian peninsula. While 

chiefly by Jugo-Slavs. The city 



Imperialistic 
program of 
Italy 



Promises 
made to 
Italy in 
1915 



AMBITIONS FOR EXPANSION IN EUROPE 

A great debt and small means to pay it, loss of man power to the 
extent of a half-miUion men, devastation of the occupied provinces 
on the northeastern frontier, unemployment among the demobilized 
soldiers, difficulty in obtaining coal for her slowly reviving industries 
— these were troubles grave enough in all conscience. But Italy in- 
creased the anxieties of the time by trying to obtain lands and people 
to which, according to British, French, and American official opinion, 
she had no right. These governments argued that the taking in of 
unwilling aliens of quite different speech and race has in the past often 
led to war, because the ruling race has been tempted, in all but a few 
cases, to persecute and drive out of the country those whom it should 
be its policy to protect ; the habit of persecution becomes fixed in the 
minds of the ruling class, and there arises a general policy of force 
which is not long in changing into naked imperialism. 

To these arguments Italy has replied by saying that both England 
and France are holding unwilling peoples under military control, and 
that her colonial enterprises are as honorable and successful as those 
of her neighbors. 

If we study the situation of Italy in the light of Italian arguments, 
we shall have a great deal of sympathy for her. She entered the war 
in 1915 with the distinct understanding that she was to gain large 
territories. On the north especially she sought territory to remove 
the historic menace of Austria. That power had crossed the great 



The Italian Situation 



131 




the city is inhabited chiefly by Italians, the surrounding country is inhabited 
was formerly Austria's chief seaport. 



northern mountain wall and held the heads of the valleys that drain 
the southern, or Italian, Tyrol ; a first concentrated rush would bring 
her down into the densely populated and fertile northern Italian plain 
(Fig. 67). In this region, at least, Italy's expectations have been 
realized. Elsewhere she has not been so fortunate. France and 
Great Britain both promised her additional territory in Africa if they 
gained African territory themselves. But in the final settlement 
France was long unwilling to make any territorial concessions to Italy 
in Africa, though the British government eventually surrendered 
considerable tracts of territory in western Egypt and British Somali- 
land. In this matter, whatever reasons may have guided her, France 
was clearly delaying a proper settlement of Italian problems. A 
basis for final agreement was laid in 1920, when France and Italy 
agreed upon a Libyan boundary, as shown in Figure 74. 

In 1915 the French and British (and the Russian government of that Purpose 
time) had agreed also that on the eastern side of the Adriatic Italy °**^® 
was to gain territory as defined by the treaty of London line (Fig. 
67). This agreement was made at a time when the old diplomatic 
methods of settling a dispute were still in vogue ; the powers thought 
of themselves as victors rightfully taking spoils from the van- 
quished. With this point of view no one would disagree when the 
vanquished had sinister designs on the nations they forced into a 
terrible war, were it not for the fact that such a policy would merely 
lead to another war. Now it was the thought of many of the soldiers 
who died for their ideals that this was a war that should end war. 



132 



The New World 



The di- 
lemma 
of the 
political 
leaders 



Italy 
obliged 
to give up 
conquered 
territory 



That could only be if the peace that followed the war were a just 
peace. Otherwise, as one statesman remarked, it would be "a peace 
that would end peace." 

To grasp this principle in its full significance took a long time, and 
the idea was especially slow in gaining a place in the thought of the 
Itahan political leaders. They felt that they had nothing tangible 
to show their people for the sacrifices of the war. A successful fight 
had been waged, but all they had to exhibit was a moral victory, and 
a moral victory will not buy coal and raw materials for factories, nor 
will it buy machinery and ships. For a long time the Italian mind 
dwelt on the practical rather than the idealistic aspects of the victory. 
The Allies, whether rightly or wrongly, came to distrust Itahan 
political judgment and became anxious about her influence in Turkey 
and northern Africa. 

It was asserted also that although Italy agreed to fight all the 
enemies of the Allies (treaty of London, 1915), she never made war 
upon Turkey, and declared war upon Germany only after she had 
been fighting with Austria for a year. She was to have a protectorate 
over central Albania only ; but she really took control of all Albania. 
Fiume was outside the treaty of London line; but she claimed that 
also. Finally, she landed troops in southwestern Anatolia (Scala 
Nuova) without the authority of the other Allied and Associated 
Powers, and in fact against their strong protests. In many quarters 
it was said that the action of the Italian government in Anatolia was 
no less radical and unauthorized than that of D'Annunzio at Fiume. 
As a result of Allied protests, the Italians at last agreed to stay behind 
a demarcation line in Anatolia. 

Italy was requested to give up the things she coveted. She had 
taken the Dodecanese, a group of islands off the coast of Asia Minor, 
in 1912 at the close of the war with Turkey; but the islands are 
Greek in speech and race, and the Allies insisted that they be turned 
over to Greece. The Dalmatian coast is sohdly Jugo-Slav, and this 
also Italy was urged to give up, though possession of it was promised 
in 1915 as an inducement to her to enter the war. Outside of 
Europe she made important but not large gains : additional territory 
in Libya (Fig. 74), a sphere in southern Anatoha (Fig. 48), owner- 
ship of the island of Castelorizzo near Rhodes, and Rhodes itself for 
a term of years. She also won the Trieste region and the Istrian 
peninsula, besides a large tract in the Trentino as far north as the 
Otzthaler Mountains, a district whose northern part is inhabited 
chiefly by German-speaking people who do not welcome Itahan rule. 



The Italian Situation 



133 




134 



The New World 




oLandi!Ck 



1 _J ItcQiaiis 

i. ■ ■ ■ 1 ladms 
Germans 



Practically UnirihaMted 
areas 



t 3 * Sli 



Fig. 70. The disputed territory of the southern Tyrol. Austria made two offers in 1915, the 
second of which would have given Italy most of her "unredeemed" people in the Trentino. 
Austria refused to make further concessions, and at length Italy went to war. By the treaty 
of St. Germain (1919) between Austria and the Allied and Associated Powers, Italy was given 
what she called her natural, or geographical, frontier in the Brenner Pass region; but it should 
be noted that she thus gains nearly 230,000 German-speaking people who are likely to create an 
irredentist problem as serious as that before 1914. From C. Battisti, II Trentino, 1917, PI. 3 ; 
O. R. Torniolo, L'Alto Adige, 1917, PI. 1. Legend applies only to that portion of the map in- 
cluded within the limits of the Tyrol gained by Italy. 

It was in the Trentino that Italy made her chief effort to win terri- 
tory by diplomatic means after the war started in 1914. To keep 
Italy out of the war, Austria offered in 1915 to give her that part of 
the Tyrol ethnically Italian (Fig. 70). Italy refused the offer, entered 
the war, and by the treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye obtained aU the 
territory south of the Brenner Pass, thus adding to her population 
about 230,000 German-speaking people. The irredentist problem of 
the Tyrol is not settled ; it is simply transferred from Italy to Austria. 



The Italian Situation 



135 




Fig. 71. View in the Brenner Pass region on Italy's present northern frontier. Southward 
through the pass have come the Teutonic invaders, again and again, to occupy the valley lands 
and threaten the rich northern plains of Italy. 



The desire for territorial expansion and the increase of her foreign Historical 
commerce is not a new thing in Itahan hfe. It should not be taken i4^^%°* 
as a sudden expression of national greed. It flows naturally from the program 
historic position of Italian cities, notably Genoa and Venice, in oriental 
trade. They were among the greatest of Mediterranean marts of 
the 12th and 13th centuries, and only entered a period of definite 
decline when the Turk reached the coast of the Near East in the 15th 
century and the Portuguese in the early years of the 16th century 
developed the commerce of the route to India by way of the Cape of 
Good Hope. In the long period from the 10th to the end of the 18th 
century, Venice held the Dalmatian Islands and a large part of the 
coast. When the western European powers were pushing on to new 
colonial fields in America, the Far East, and Africa, Italy stiU moved 
in a Mediterranean orbit. Trade, not territory, was the limited am- 
bition of her regional leaders. 

In modern trade, however, territorial ownership is a vital matter. 
Tariff's, consular service, coaling and cable stations, spheres of influ- 
ence, capital investments, and emigration, all have greater or less 
relation to diplomatic exchanges and advantages that spring from 



Benefits 
of distant 
territories 



136 



The New World 



actual ownership of exploited land and people. Italy has been slow 
and vacillating in building this idea into her national poUcy. Her 
present effort is designed to prevent her latest opportunity from es- 
caping. 

That Italy has pushed for advantages with her aUies is also not 
strange when we remember her traditional enmity toward France. 
Up to 1915 Italy was still formally allied with Germany and Austria 
(the Triple Alhance). Suddenly she changed friends. Limited in her 
demands by the counter proposals of France, Great Britain, and the 
United States, her leaders were not sure of those practical advantages 
that they had expected. There was for a time, after the war, a growth 
of pro-German feeling. Thus Italy finds herself again in the middle 
of the road. Her future diplomatic and commercial orientation can 
scarcely be predicted. 



Union of 

Italian 

peoples 



Annual 
loss of 
population 



Lack of 
fuel for 
Italian in- 
dustries 



INTERNAL POLITICAL AND INDUSTRIAL PROBLEMS 

The domestic problems of Italy are large and menacing. It was 
only sixty years ago that she became a unified modern state, and the 
forces of disunion that long kept her the prey of foreign powers and 
that fostered the petty quarrels between neighboring states of the 
Italian peninsula have not yet been destroyed. The long struggle 
between the Vatican and the Court has kept her people divided. 
The good of the country demands a strong, unified government, and 
this can develop only if her domestic problems are solved. 

Italy is one of the most densely populated states of Europe. The 
chmate is sunny and the soil fertile ; the crops are varied and abun- 
dant, the people industrious. But each year thousands of Italians 
emigrate to newer lands in the United States and South America. 
While many of them, having acquired a modest fortune, return to 
stay, and many others return for a season only, a greater mmiber 
remain in the new lands. The children of Italy to a large extent 
become the citizens of the Argentine or the United States. 

In part, this emigration is due to the lack of coal and 
petroleum. Without native fuel, Italy can develop certain manu- 
factures only to the extent to which she can import coal. She must 
purchase coal from America and from England chiefly. While 
seventy-seven million tons of coal are to be exported to her by 
Germany in the ten years ending 1929, it is almost certain that this 
amount will be diminished. Not only does the lack of coal in Italy 
increase the cost of her manufactured wares to her own people; 



The Italian Situation 



137 



it tends also to make 
her import her manu- 
factured goods from 
abroad. The northern 
mountain regions will 
enable her to develop 
water power to take the 
place of coal in some 
degree ; but this is a 
possibility of the future 
rather than a remedy 
for present problems. 

Sulphur and mercury 
are the only minerals 
produced in large quan- 
tities in Italy. Italy 
held the mercury mines 
of Idria (Fig. 138) from 
the armistice of No- 
vember 1918, and these, 
finally allotted to her 
by treaty with Jugo- 




Mineral 
resources 



Fig. 72. Average annual emigration of Italy's population for 
the years 1902-1906. Figures represent losses per hundred 
. 1 • 1 thousand. Below the lines A-A' and B-B' the emigrants go 

Olavia, place her m the chiefly to the United States and South America. Elsewhere 
fir<st nr»>iitinn in tVlP ^^^ emigrants go chiefly to other European countries. There 
lllbt PUS.1L1U11 111 Uie ^j.^ ^jg^ migratory elements that return annually to the home- 
land. From Guido Assereto, L'lialia e le sue colonie, 1912, 
Pis. 30-31. For the final boundary between Italy and Jugo- 
slavia as determined by the treaty of Rapallo, see Figure 138. 



position in 

world in the production 

of mercury. Of the 

world's total of 4000 

tons of mercury, Italy produced during 1919 nearly 1700 tons. The sul- 
phur of Italy comes chiefly from the volcanic region of Sicily and con- 
stitutes 47 per cent of the world's total production. But it is a minor 
mineral, and its total value is not sufficient to make it the basis of such 
great industries as arise in the iron and coal fields of the world. At 
best, Italy is a poor country industrially. 

The need for developing industries is the more serious for Italy strikes and 
at the present time because she has not the ready means, found in the demo- 

T-iii 1T-I />ii'i ^ ^ ' c • bilization 

bngland and France, lor absorbing her unemployed in lactones of large 
and mills. Her people are poorer than before they entered the war, """^^ 
and for a long time to come the channels of trade and development 
will be clogged because of the abnormal conditions, and especially 
because of the waste produced by the war. This is bound to lead 
to general internal disorder, which in turn increases the number and 



138 



The New World 



General 
lack of in- 
terest in 
politics, 
except in 
the cities 



Italy finan- 
cially hard 
hit by the 



seriousness of her problems. The strikes prevalent during the late 
months of 1919 and throughout 1920 have disarranged the machinery 
for coal importation and reduced fuel production at home, thus making 
heavy inroads upon Italy's limited supply of valuable timber. In 
some cities revolutionary workmen have taken over factories without 
opposition from the military forces, to the still further disarrange- 
ment of industrial life. 

The government of the country is the result of struggles between 
determined leaders of the various parties or factions. The mass of 
the people have little voice in important decisions. For example, 
the labor party of the cities, the so-caUed proletariat, denounced 
D'Annunzio's adventure at Fiume and opposed the effort of the 
ruling class to make it fight for imperial ambitions. In a few cases, 
notably at Trieste, there was even a demand for a republic. 

The greater number of the Italian people are farmers, who are 
on the whole without education and who take little interest in politics. 
(Figure 73 shows the distribution of illiteracy in Italy.) They are 
against communism ; that is, they wish to' keep the principle of pri- 
vate ownership. But in 1919 they did demand, and secure to some 
extent as a result of the fear of the government, the use of unculti- 
vated lands on the large estates, the latifiindia. There appeared to 
be no choice for the government in this matter, for early in October 
1919, agrarian disorders, especially in the south, grew in intensity 
and in scale, and at one time reached a point that threatened civil 
They were especially marked in Sicily, where, in the first two 



war. 



weeks, thirty persons were killed and a hundred wounded. Peasants 
went about in armed bands, taking forcible possession of uncultivated 
estates. The disorders began to decline at the end of a month, stopped 
in less than three months, and revived for a time in 1920. 

The per capita wealth of Italy is lower than that of Great Britain, 
France, or the United States. She had just finished the costly war 
with Turkey in 1912 when she had a new war to face. Only by im- 
porting coal, iron, and cotton in order to increase her industrial pro- 
duction can she hope to pay her staggering war debt. At best it will 
be difficult for her to meet current expenses and the interest on her 
debts, to say nothing of paying the principal. 

Altogether praiseworthy have been her efforts at financial recon- 
struction thus far. By practicing economy and by taxing her people 
heavily to pay for current expenses, Italy has shown a disposition 
to meet her obligations. If she continues in this course, her credit 
will be good, her money will rise in exchange value, her trade will 



The Italian Situation 



139 



ILLITERACY 




Fig. 73. Compare with Figure 72 to see how Italian illiteracy affects the character of the popu- 
lation of the United States. European neighbors of Italy get the largest number of emigrating 
literates, but character and literacy are not necessarily related. All territory outside the bound- 
aries of 1914 is cross-lined downward and to the right. Compiled from data given on sheet 
15 of Mori, Nuovo atlante de geografia fisica, politica ed economica, Vol. I, 1918. 

increase. It will be a real test of Italian national character to come 
out of the present difficulties without throwing the country back into 
the state of disunion arid poverty from which it rose only after so 
long and painful a struggle. 

Europe and the world need a strong Italy. The genius of her Reduc- 
people, their industry and strength, should be developed, not im- a°ma° 
paired. Relieved from the prolonged threat of invasion from the ^^^^^ ^ 

X o n . boon to 

north, she can afford to reduce her army and navy to small size and itaiy 



140 



The New World 



Feeble and 
artificial 
colonial 
efforts 



thus throw off one of the chief burdens of the past. The capital 
formerly spent in preparation for war will build dynamos, railways, 
ships, and factories, and wiU put her on the road to becoming a stronger 
commercial nation. 

ITALIAN COLONIAL INTERESTS 

Figure 74 shows the distribution of Italian colonies. Their relative 
poverty and unimportance are noteworthy. Every step in the 
direction of colonial expansion has been costly and disappointing. 
But Italian ambitions wiU not be satisfied until there are Italian 
colonies in the lands bordering the Mediterranean — in Adalia 
(Turkish) and in Africa (Berber and Arab). 

Italian efforts at expansion have been wholly artificial. Lacking 
internal political cohesion, without colonial experience, having no 
capital for the development of colonial enterprises, yet proud of her 
traditions and entertaining the hope of a revival of military powers 
and the ancient glories of Rome, Italy could take only feeble steps 
along the road by which Great Britain and France had passed to power. 

Assab on the western Red Sea coast was purchased in 1870, where- 
upon Italian colonial ambition declined until 188.5, when it was 
suddenly revived. The port of Massowah (Fig. 74) was occupied. 
The vast and continuous stream of Italian emigration, due to heavy 
taxes and a hard life, was to be turned into colonial channels. Yet Italy 
had no large modern merchant marine, and was obliged to import coal 
and iron for the manufacture of raw materials from possible colonies. 

Colonial expansion took its most active form in East Africa. Italy 
pushed into Abyssinia, and in 1889, by the treaty of Ucciali, claimed 
virtual suzerainty over the country. But Menelik repudiated the 
treaty, claiming that it read differently in the Abyssinian text, and 
in 1896 at the battle of Adowa a force of 12,000 Italians was almost 
annihilated by an army of 80,000 Abyssinians. Italy was forced to 
give up her idea of an Abyssinian protectorate, and in addition she 
had to pay a heavy indemnity. 

Only the Eritrea and Somaliland regions remained, with their arid 
climate and poor soil. A poor late-comer in the colonial field, Italy had 
only the crumbs that fell from the British and French tables. Yet 
the Italians have taken intelligent and energetic action with respect 
to the resources in their possession. They have built roads, trained 
native troops for police purposes, drilled artesian wells, built light- 
houses, established schools, encouraged immigration, and regulated 
the water supply. 



Tlie Italian Situation 



141 




Fig. 74. Italian colonies. To Italy were assigned the islands of Rhodes and of Castelorizzo 
near the mainland of Anatolia. (See Figure 158.) Additions of territory, at British expense, 
were made west of Egypt and in the eastern part of Kenya Colony, and the French agreed to a 
rectification of the Libyan boundary. Based on UAfrique Fran<;aise, January 1920, p. 10; 
March 1920, p. 89 ; Mouvevient Geographique, 15 August 1920, p. 438. 



Of far greater importance to Italy than her own dependencies are 
Italian "colonies" established under other flags. Wherever the Ital- 
ians have gone in large numbers — America, Argentina, Brazil ■ — they 
have formed settlements of great benefit to Italian trade. Italian 
merchants have established branch houses, Italian newspapers have 
kept up interest in the homeland, Italian banks have facilitated the 
flow of credits. Returning emigrants, with large aggregate funds, 
have enriched Italy's national treasury and promoted home indus- 
tries. It is in such colonies in large and rich commercial nations 
rather than in the poor national possessions in Africa that Italy 
has reaped real commercial benefits. 



U^l 



The New JVorld 



The Ber- 
bers ami 
Anil>s of 
Libya 



Modo of 
li(t< of Arabs 
and Berbers 



Division of 
the laud 
into tribal 
territories 



The war- 
like Tua- 
r«gs 



ljl)y(i {Tripoli) 

Til norlluM-M Africa. Tlalian iiileivsls irnlor in llit^ proviiur of Libya, 
uliicli Ixuamo a pari of [\\v Italian ivalin as a irsull of [\\c Turkish- 
llalian war of lOU-lDl';?. 

Libya is llu> ^Moal ro{;ioii bohveon wesloni Kir\pl and Tunis. It 
is inbiibittnl by MobaninuHlan IhmIums and Arabs, l)otb of Nvhich 
stocks arc stroni:;ly mixed witli iu>i:;ro blood, t)Nvinjj: to the con- 
tinual lloNv of slaNt^s northward from central Africa. Slaves are still 
kept, and, until the Italian occuf)ation, were exported from those parts 
of northern Africa that were in the control of Turkey. In Libya the 
Berbers have been pushed back into the mountains by the Arab in- 
vaders. In tlu^ largi' towns tlu^ Arabs are also mixed with Berbers, 
.lews, l^gyptians, and nativc>s of Algeria, Tunis, and iMuopean coun- 
l ries. 

The Arabs came into Libya as a result of the Alohaniniedan con- 
(piesl of the country in the Tlh century. In the 11th century there 
came a still strouirer inllow of Arab robber tribes. Their conquest 
of the coastal region was comf)lcte: but they were never able to 
cxtiMid th(Mr t'ontrol far inland. Tlu^y live in tents, own tlocks and 
herds, and raise dates and other tropical prinlucts in the oases scat- 
tered along the depressions or along the upland borders where a little 
water is available. The Berbers are almost altogether vsedentary, cul- 
tivating (he soil and living in permanent habitations. The oases of 
the coast are fertile and well-watered in Libya, and these draw to 
tliem, in the harvest season, many nomadic tribes of the desert. 

The nomadic tribes of Libya have a patriarchal organization, and 
[Moperly within the tribe is collective. Ivich family lives by itself 
in a gnnip of lift ecu or twenty tents, and a collection of families con- 
stitutes a tribe with particular ownership of oases and pasture land, be- 
\ond which it cannot go. The boundaries are clearly marked and 
recognized in the oases, but rather badly marked in the pastures, and 
quarrels are frequent. Kven the largest towns are not big cities in the 
American sense of the word. Tripoli has about 7;i.000 people. Ben- 
sliazi 85.000, and the others are much smaller. 

One of the most interesting tribes (^f northern Africa are the Tua- 
regs. They are warlike and engage ihieily in raiding caravans that 
traverse the desert. NNhile a few live in Libya, most of them live 
farther west in the French colonies of Tunis, Algeria, and Morocco. 
They are treacherous and revengeful, and they have been brought 
under ci>ntrol bv the Lrcnch only w ith extreme dilliculty. The Senussi 



The Italian Situation 143 

(page 50) have some of (heir chief centers and strongholds in Libya, 
wlienee they wield great [)()niieal and n^ligious iiillnenee over Saharan 
tribes of Mohannnedans, iH)th near and remote. 

Dnring the World War, tlie interior of Libya ami some of the coast Operations 
hne was recaptured from llalv by Arabs, Turks, and (Jermans work- !," ^'^^1 

r ... during the 

ing in eooperalion. A final armisliee willi the Arab chiefs was not World War 
signed until 'li April IJ)!}), when ihey agreed to recognize Italian 
sovereignty over the connlry. 

During ihe lasl few years (he value of the trade leaving Libyan Decline 
ports has steadily declined, (ioods worth more than $;{,()00,()()() ^l^^^^'''' 
were exported from Benghazi, the second port of tlu> country, in 100.5. 
In 1J)()S the exports amounted to a lilll(> more than $1,.5()0,(H)(), and 
in 15)13 they had fallen to less than .5'2(U),(H)0. 'Phis dcMline in trade 
was caused by the unrest and brigandage which prevailcnl in the 
interior, and by the success of the British and l^'nMieh in d(>lleet- 
ing Ihe trade of the Lake Tchad region to Egyptian and Tunisian 
outlets. 

The interior of Libya does not seem capable of important develop- 
ment. In many places it is im[)ossible to build railroads or construct 
roads, since in this portion of the Sahara the des(^rt sand shifts to an 
unusual degree before the driving winds. Agriculture' is possible only 
in the oases, and irrigation elsewhere is out of tlu> (piestion. To these 
natural ditlieultitvs must be added the fact that Italy has assumed a 
privileged position with respect to her colony, and foreign merchants 
must pay double the customs duties and anchorage charges collected 
from Italian shij)})ing. 

Under the Uomans, Libya and Cyrenaica had a far larger po{)u- Difficulties 
lation than they now contain. \\ ilh the invasion of the Islamic Arab, confronting 

111 • Italian 

the country was depopulated and large sections revertcMl to the desert, officials in 
To control the })opulalion of (>()(),()()() Berl)ers and Arabs, to rcH'oneile ' ^* 
the natives to luiro[)ean ideas and culture, to reestablish the irrigation 
works, to destroy the locusts, — or at least to diminish tluMr numbers, 
— and to carry out sanit;uy and educational measures, will be no easy 
task for Italy. 

The administration of Libyan peoples calls for adaptation to tlie 
spirit and needs luul way of life of strange and hostile tribes. For 
years to come a considerable military force will be required merely 
to pacify the country. Moreover, the colony will not pay. It will 
not be possible to expand into adjoining fertile regions having a rich 
trade. Libya is a liability that will test Italy's interest in didicult 
colonial problems and her power of handling them. 



144 



The New World 



Italian op- 
erations in 
Asia Minor 



The 

Albanian 

venture 



Italian Interests in Asia Minor and Albania 

After her war with Turkey in 1912, Italy sought privileges on the 
Turkish mainland opposite her new-won archipelago of the Dodecanese. 
Italian bondholders of the Ottoman Pubhc Debt obtained a concession 
from the Turkish government for a railway hue to run from Adalia 
on the coast to the inland town of Buldur at the southeastern end of 
the Aidin railw ay. By this means Italy hoped to win the trade of a 
rich coastal low land region and its tributary valleys, whence subtropi- 
cal products are exported, hke rice, tobacco, opium, cotton, and fruit. 

More recent advances of the Itahans have emphasized their eager- 
ness to win a foothold in Asia Minor. They occupied the harbor 
of Marmara as a coaling station and landed troops at Adalia in April 
1919, when all that had been agreed to by the Allies was that Italy 
should have a battaUon in Turkey. They also sent battleships to 
Smyrna and landed 500 men at Scala Nuova. 

These operations of the Itahans, taken independently of the other 
AUies, were a source of anxiety to the Greeks about Smyrna and to the 
French in Syria, and also caused grave unrest among the Mohammed- 
ans, who feared that even temporary occupation by the Italians would 
mean a loss of sovereignty or of important commercial adA^antages. 

The final result of Italian ambitions in Asia Minor is conditional 
possession of the island of Rhodes. At the time of signing the Turkish 
treaty (treaty of Sevres, 1920), Italy also agreed to relinquish the 
Dodecanese to Greece, except for Rhodes, which is to have a plebiscite 
in a few years. If the people of Rhodes vote for union w^ith Greece, 
Italy will retire, provided Great Britain also retires from Cyprus — 
which Great Britain will probably never do. 

Equally disappointing to Italy has been her Albanian venture. Be- 
ginning with the occupation of large parts of Albania and claims to all of 
it as a protecting or mandatory power, she retired her troops to Valona, 
only to be driven out of this port by Albanian forces. On 3 August 
1920 she signed an agreement with Albania by the terms of which she 
abandons Valona (much overestimated as the naval key to the Adri- 
atic), but retains the island of Saseno, which commands it, and the use 
of the bay of Valona when necessary for shelter or refitting. Italy 
also has the right to occupy and fortify the two points of land that 
inclose Valona on the north and south, and to have freedom of action 
if the integrity of Valona and Albania is threatened. She recognizes 
the independence and unity of Albania, 'and hopes in this way to neu- 
tralize anti-Italian influence in both northern and southern Albania. 



CHAPTER SIX 

THE DEMOCRATIC DRIFT IN SPAIN 

Though Spain neither gained nor lost territory as a result of the World 
War, her international relations have taken on new aspects by reason 
of her participation in the fulfillment of the treaties that closed the 
war. She is a member of the Council of the League of Nations, and 
her representatives sit on several important commissions. She also 
enjoys a new status in the Spanish Zone of northern Morocco. Her 
financial condition is so greatly improved as a result of her active 
trade as a neutral during the war that she has entered upon a new 
period of industrial development. The features of Spanish fife that 
may counterbalance these favorable conditions are the social insta- 
bility of the people and the political instability of the state. In 
recent ye£U"s there has been a rapid development of the radical, or 
socialist, movement in Spain, and the revival of a separatist tend- 
ency on the part of the provinces, a tendency which has manifested 
itself repeatedly in Spanish history, despite the unifying influence of 
the long struggle against the Moor. 

RADICALISM IN SPAIN 

The period of recent socialist activity corresponds roughly with sodaiand 
the reign of Alfonso XIII, since his coming of age in 1902, though ^^^^J^^^ 
the impelfing causes of unrest do not lie in the character of the king, 
who is popular, or in his influence in government, which has always 
been conciliatory and constructive. A few months before his core- 
nation there were serious riots at Barcelona and Saragossa. In 
1903 riots took place at Salamanca, Barcelona, and Madrid. Stimu- 
lated by a crop failure and a famine in Andalusia, rioting occurred in 
southern Spain in 1905 ; disorders led to the proclamation of martial 
law in Catalonia; SeviUe, Granada, Oviedo, Bilbao, and Valencia 
were centers of serious disturbance. In 1908 martial law was pro- 
claimed in Barcelona, and the restoration of order was followed by the 
passage of laws that improved living conditions — at least to a modest 
degree — in the industrial regions. 

The more liberal policy of the government following these various causes of 
disorders might have had a happy outcome had it not been for native ^^^^^l^ 
troubles in Morocco, which required the increase of the Spanish mili- 
tary forces and the calling out of the reserves. In Catalonia there 

145 



146 



The New World 




Fig. 75. General view of Toledo, a town of great historic interest as a center of Christian 
military organization in the reconquest of Spain from the Moors. 

were strikes and disorders as a protest against the government's 
policy in Morocco. These had their center at Barcelona, where in 
July 1909 a revolutionary mob, consisting among others of Spanish 
workmen and disorderly spirits from South America and eastern 
Europe, attacked the convents and churches and engaged in three days 
of street fighting. It was necessary to estabUsh martial law through- 
out the whole of Spain on 28 July, and for two months the coun- 
try was kept in order only by military means. Ferrer, an anarchist 
and leader in the disorder, was tried by court martial and shot. 

On top of these difficulties came the news of the defeat of the 
Spanish forces in Morocco by the Rif tribesmen, who were subdued 
only after six months of hard fighting. Thereupon trouble broke out 
afresh. Constitutional guarantees had to be suspended in 1911, owing 
to a general strike on government-owned railways. In 1912 another 
strike was avoided only by putting the military in control of the train 
service. To the opposition elements the government has become the 
symbol of inefficiency. 

That Spain should have continued its traditional form of government 
without a general revolution is a tribute to its democratic king, for 
the liberal agitation that started before the beginning of his reign has 
never ceased. While the loss of the last of her American and Asiatic 
colonies, in 1898, might have enabled her leaders to turn their atten- 
tion to domestic problems, the action of the radical elements in indus- 



The Democratic Drift in Spain 147 

trial regions hastened the country into a series of bitter contests, the 
end of which is not yet in view. 

In November 1919 a lockout was put into force at Barcelona by internal 
the employers, and the threat was made by the Spanish Employers' ^atioT'^^ 
Association to extend the lockout to the whole of Spain if the gov- 
ernment did not treat more fairly the two parties to the quarrel — 
employers and employed. Each accused the other of political motives. 
By January 1920 terrorism and bitterness had greatly increased, and 
strike agitation had extended to Madrid, Valencia, Vigo, and other 
cities from Barcelona. Closely connected with these disturbances were 
the perils of the army juntos, which exist for political and illegal as well 
as for professional purposes. Growing in power, they may menace 
the security of the state in times of internal disorder. 

SEPARATIST TENDENCIES AND THEIR HISTORIC CAUSES 

The World War of 1914-1918 divided Spain. Many Spaniards are 
jealous of French cultural influence in Latin America and resent 
French pressure on Spain in Moroccan affairs. Gibraltar is re- 
membered against Great Britain. The liberal and many of the intel- 
lectual elements favored the AUies during the war ; the conservative 
elements were in sympathy with Germany. 

Running Uke a thread through aU the political turmoil and the Reia- 
disturbed social and financial conditions of Spain is the vexed ques- between 
tion of the relations between church and state, wliich reached its cli- church 

and state 

max in the attempt of the government to control the religious orders. 
It was during a period of general protest against the corruptions and 
privileges of the ecclesiastical bodies, and specifically in the year 
1836, that religious congregations had been banished from Spain. 
But in 1851 the' law of 1836 was so far altered as to permit the re- 
establishment of certain orders. From that time down to the present, 
the growth in the number and power of the orders has been rapid, and 
their political and social influence is formidable. Every attempt to 
tax or control them has been met by violent clerical agitation. Ex- 
empted from taxes, they have been enabled to engage in commercial 
projects and industrial work in such a way as to compete unfairly 
with lay rivals. 

Troublesome as it already was, the problem presented a more seri- 
ous aspect with the change from a monarchist to a republican form 
of government in Portugal in 1910, when the religious congregations 
expelled from Portugal came to Spain. There were also ecclesiastical 



148 The New World 

refugees from France that came to Spain at the time of the separa- 
tion of church and state in France (1905). 
Natural In addition to the pohtical factors, there are geographical conditions 

'^f^^'afn ^^^^^ make it difficult to maintain the territorial integrity of Spain. 
The Spanish peninsula is broken up into a number of natural regions 
separated by formidable barriers which, in the past, exercised a 
strong influence upon the local inhabitants, and later, upon their 
social and judicial systems as well as upon their political forms and 
solidarity. The great extent of the interior plateau, the broken 
character of its borders, and the ruggedness of the more prominent 
sierras, have made it more difficult to diminish those diversities of 
speech, political thought, and social character which for a long time 
kept the populations of Spain apart and which still threaten to turn 
the country back into the state of disunion that has repeatedly pre- 
vailed. From the earliest times down to the union of Castile and 
Aragon late in the 15th century, as well as in the period following, 
princely rivalries have disfigured the political life of Spain. 
Effect of The population of Spain numbers about 20,000,000, and the den- 

*^? f^" sity is a little more than 100 to the square mile. Considering its geo- 

pulsion -J ^ .,7, 

of the graphical position and its natural resources, the country is very thinly 

populated as compared with the rest of Europe. The long succes- 
sion of military expeditions conducted against the Moors during their 
occupation of most of the Spanish peninsula greatly decreased the 
native population. On the other hand, the country never recovered 
the loss sustained by the expulsion of the Moors in 1609. It was a 
great blow to agriculture, for the Moorish peoples of the southern 
semi-arid region were masters in the reclamation of arid lands. They 
had built irrigation works and applied a system of cultivation far su- 
perior to that formerly in vogue. The Moors introduced sugar cane, 
cultivated cotton rather widely, and in general improved the breeds of 
live stock. Of less importance, but still a considerable factor, was the 
expulsion of the Jews late in the 15th century. The whole colonial 
period was marked by emigration and heavy loss of life in mihtary 
expeditions and in the struggles of the pioneers in new and unhealthful 
conditions. It must be remembered that there was no such thing as a 
science of tropical medicine in the days of Spanish colonial expansion. 
The earlier history of Spain has some striking modern parallels. 
Spain made great progress during the period of the Roman occupation 
and possessed a certain unity, due to the general use of the Roman law 
and the organization and almost universal influence of the Christian 
church. When the Roman Empire fell apart with the onset of the 



Moors 



The Democratic Drift in Spain 



149 



Steppes 
k Irrigated areas 
_ Boundary between 
arid and humid regions 




Fig. 76. The greater part of the plains and valley country of Spain is dry. The boundary 
between arid and humid regions is after Brunhes, La geographic humaine, 1917; the limits of 
the steppe regions are from E. Reyes Prosper, Las cstepas de Espana y su vegetacion, 1915. 
Each steppe district has a local name ; e.g., the one about Saragossa is called Estcpa iberica, the 
one about Granada Estepa granadina. 

barbarian invasions, the accustomed routes of commerce were broken, 
and the invaded country dissolved into its component fragments. 

In its fragmented condition the peninsula was weak and subject to weakness 
foreign conquests ; hence, when the Moslems came in 711, the country spa^g^ 
feU an easy prey to their armies. The success of the Moslems lay opposition 
not in their political organization or military strength, but in the Moors 
social and regional disorganization of the people of Spain. The north- 
ward progress of the Moors was almost unobstructed. In 718 they 
crossed the Pyrenees and invaded the country of the Franks, only to 
meet with defeat at the hands of Charles Martel at the battle of 
Tours in 732. Monasteries and cities, landowners and local rulers, 
paid tribute to the invader. Some of the people even accepted the 
Mohammedan religion. 

The invaders had come from the desert. They were the last western 



150 



The Neiv World 



Reconquest 
ot the land 




.Arabic place 
names 



extension of the great 
Arab wave that swept 
from east of the Red Sea 
over northern Africa. 
Their Mohammedanism 
was hardly orthodox; 
their blood was ex- 
tremely mixed. The 
"Moors" were a sort of 
loose confederation of 
Arabs, Berbers, Syrians, 
and others, and they 
quarreled among them- 
selves. The Berber re- 
volted because he was 
assigned the barren cen- 
tral plateau. The vari- 
ous Arab tribes quar- 
reled as a result of 
rivalries and disunion 
at the heart of the Arab 
world. Only by main- 
taining a mercenary army of African negroes were the Moors able to 
keep their Spanish possessions. At that they were never able com- 
pletely to subjugate the peninsula; the Basques and other isolated 
groups in naturally strong positions on either side of the Pyrenees 
and in northwestern Spain maintained theu- independence throughout 
the long period of Moslem occupation. 

We may summarize the greater part of the period of Moorish occu- 
pation by saying that it was thoroughly confused; and as order and 
organization developed in the Christian portions of Spain not occu- 
pied by the Moors, the long strife began wliich ended in the reconquest 
of the land. As military inefficiency and corruption increased among 
the Moors, the Christian kings advanced into the Moorish country 
with weU-disciplined cavahy belonging to the great monastic mihtary 
orders. Cordova was conquered in 1236, Seville in 1248, Valencia 
in 1237, and in 1340 at the battle of the Rio Salado the African in- 
vaders suffered a critical defeat, after which they were only occa- 
sionally a dangerous factor in Spanish hfe. Their last stronghold, 
Granada, fell in 1492. 

From 1340 forward, Spanish history records a long and pamlul 



Fig. 77. The numbers represertt the dates on which Spain 
and Portugal were reconquered from the Moors by Chris- 
tian forces, in each case up to the limit shown by the 
broken line on which the date stands. It was only m 1492 
that Granada, the last stronghold of the Moors, was retaken 
The dots represent the locations of towns and geographical 
features that still have Moorish names. After Reclus, 
L'homme et la terre, Vol. Ill, p. 448; IV, p. 159. 



The Democratic Drift in Spain 



151 



process of unification. It was not until the early years of the 18th 
century that a really ardent spirit of nationalism was displayed. 
Except for a common religion and a common throne, there would 
hardly have been any progress at all. For patriotism in Spain is a 
local thing that reflects the geographical division of the country; a 
man says he is a GaUcian, an Asturian, a Castilian, an Andalusian ; 
he rarely thinks of himself as a Spaniard. While Castilian is the 
literary language of Spain, the people of each great region have a 
distinctive speech. In Aragon the people speak a dialect of Cas- 
tilian ; the people of Catalonia speak a dialect similar to that of south- 
ern France ; the Basques have a distinct language of their own, and 
both Catalan and Castihan have several important dialects. 

Locally, Spaniard is separated from Spaniard by mountain barriers, 
by tradition, by language, by social customs, by grades of society. 
Cities were long arrayed against cities, and villages against villages. 
There was unequal distribution of the taxes ; there were special privi- 
leges to this and that city or monastery, and the nobles were exempted 
from taxation. With the increase of landed possessions by the nobles 
and monasteries, a heavier burden of taxation was thrown upon the 
towns. These difficulties have their effect even in our own time. The 
present contest between church and state reaches back to the time 




Fig. 78. Granada, a stronghold of the Moors in Spain. After its capture in 1492 by Spanish 
troops the Moorish leaders were driven into Africa. The famous palace of the Alhambra stando 
on the height at the left. 



152 



The New World 



Decline of 
Spanish 
character 
and the 
loss of 
empire 




TaDgieavj-^l 



Fig. 79. The generalized language boundaries of 
Spain. From Agostini, L'Europe ethnique et lin- 
Quistique, 1 : 10,000,000, 1917. 



of the Christianization of 
Spain. In Spain as in France 
and Italy, and almost every 
other European country, the 
fortunes of the country are 
strongly affected by the com- 
plications of history. If soci- 
ety is steadied by age-old cus- 
toms, it is also thwarted at 
times by the power of histori- 
cal fact and precedent. 

Though it had its glorious 
days, Spanish colonial history 
is remarkable not only for the 
great extent of its field, but 
also for its rapid decline after reaching a brilliant climax. The last 
stage of the process came in 1898, when, as a result of the Spanish- 
American War, Spain lost to the United States aU but a few of her 
Pacific possessions, which few she later sold to Germany (page 202). 
Her West Indian possessions also were lost, and nothing now remains 
to her in the way of colonies except Rio de Oro, Spanish Guinea, a 
few small islands in the Gulf of Guinea, and small portions of Mo- 
rocco — the northern and southern Spanish Zones (Fig. 80). The 
causes of Spanish colonial losses are many, and some of them are 
still embedded in the national life. Heavy emigration during the 
colonial period, the expulsion of Jews and Moors in the 15th and 16th 
centuries and also earlier, special exemptions from taxes, government 
interference in trade, a lack of industry among some classes, and an 
exceptional number of convents and monasteries, are among the chief 
causes. Government intervention in trade became a habit, and yet 
the government, until quite recent years, has never done anything 
constructive in modifying geographical conditions and increasing 
productivity. On the contrary, chiefly through the institution known 
as the Mesta, an organization of the pastoral interests, it long favored 
grazing at the expense of agriculture and forestry, and it did not 
adequately maintain the irrigation systems developed by the Moors 
in the south of Spain. 



PRESENT POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC SITUATION 

To break up along lines of race and local interest would be greatly 
to the disadvantage both of all Spain and of the smaller units, and one 



The Democratic Drift in Spain 



153 



Canary ; 



of the problems of the 
day is to accomphsh a 
change toward demo- 
cratic rule and yet hold 
the country together so 
that the different parts 
may have the benefit of 
free exchange of prod- 
ucts in a fairly well- 
balanced state. The 
setting up of a number 
of independent states, 
with the resulting in- 
crease in boundary 
lines and the creation 
of boundary disputes, 
would complicate the 
social and commercial 
life of the Spanish pen- 
insula and weaken the 
Spanish people. 

The outstanding 
problems of Spanish 
government relate to 

1 + 1 + + ■ Fig. 80. Spanish possessions in Africa. It has been arranged 

tne governmental aitl- with France that zone A may be occupied by Spain at her 

tude toward the DolicV Pl^^s'^r^- The heavily shaded area north of zone A is the 

. ^ "^ southern zone of Spanish Morocco ; a similarly shaded zone 

of organized labor. The south of Gibraltar is the northern zone. Froili Stieler's /fand- 

labor element is Cen- «^^«-' and the (?.o^rap/ucaZ /o.ma^, June 1920. 

tered chiefly in three cities, — Barcelona, Bilbao, and Valencia. The 
demands of the labor party are for an autonomy so complete as 
practically to remove the laborers from the control of the non-indus- 
trial part of the population, but they would be clearly outnumbered 
at the present time by other political elements. 

The King of Spain is himself inclined toward larger and larger demo- 
cratic rights, together with an increase in the constitutional powers 
of the law-making body. But more than once in the past few" years 
it has been a question whether he would ally himself with the working 
population closely enough to maintain his throne. During the World 
War, though he was surrounded by pro-German influences, his sym- 
pathy for the Allied cause was repeatedly proved. By maintaining a 
neutral position, Spain was able to increase her trade, and the resulting- 




Separation 
of Spain 
into small 
states inad- 
visable 



Policy of or- 
ganized 
labor a 



Attitude 
of the 
demo- 
cratic king 



154 The New World 

prosperity helped to stay the oft-impending revolution. It was freely 
predicted that a revolution would occur directly after the war, but 
the economic rearrangement of tlie life of the country was effected 
with sufficient skill to delay it still longer. 

In view of the strong opposition of the conservative Spanish ele- 
ments — the nobles, the landed proprietors, and the capitalists — 
it is doubtful if evolution of government can come about by orderly 
processes. Their philosophy is frankly that of the privileged caste. 
Perhaps the chief hope of the present lies in the cooperative asso- 
ciations, or Catholic Syndicates, first organized in 1918. They 
serve as employment bureaus, provide a workman's bank, care for the 
sick, and exert themselves to prevent oppression ; in return the work- 
man promises not to strike, and the employer agrees to the arbitration 
of labor difficulties. So rapidly has the movement grown that there 
are 600,000 workers enrolled in more than 4000 local syndicates. 
The pro- ^'^ important political influence is exerted by a group of pro- 

French French Spaniards, which is anti-monarchical as well as anti-cleri- 
cal. It is a large and influential element, located chiefly in the in- 
dustrial towns and capable of effective organization. Opposed to 
it are the aristocratic class, the church, and the peasantry. The line 
of separation between the two groups became sharper when the 
French government seized the church properties in France and ex- 
pelled large numbers of priests and nuns, who took refuge in Spain 
(page 147). Opposition on this score cannot fail to diminish with the 
recent establishment of better relations between the French govern- 
ment and the Vatican (page 81). 
Conflict with Spain continues to be suspicious of French expansion, in spite of the 
French treaty of 1904, mutually recognizing Spanish and French rights in 
interests Morocco. In 1911 the two countries were close to a military clash. 
In 1912 their differences were harmonized by an agreement extend- 
ing Spanish territory and giving to Tangier, with a district of nearly 
150 square miles about it, an international status. Spain was to 
have 40 per cent and France 60 per cent of the stock of a railway 
to be constructed between Tangier and Fez. 

Small as it is, the Spanish Zone of northern Morocco is a great 

of the drain upon Spanish resources. To keep the people of the region in 

Zon?^ order requires an army of occupation of 80,000 men, and the expense 

involved is not offset by products of equivalent value to Spain. The 

sole commercial advantage appears to be related to a railway tunnel 

which it is proposed to build under the Straits of Gibraltar as part of 

■ a line to extend southwestward to the coast of Africa at Rio del Oro, 



The Democratic Drift in Spain 



155 




SPAIN/ 5 

Gibraltar 
Ceuta 



Alhnran I. 36 



Fig. 81. The northern Spanish Zone in Morocco. The spelling of "Zafarin Islands" follows 
the United States Hydrographic OfRce charts; on some maps the name is spelled "Chaf a- 
rinas." After map in the Geographical Journal, May 1920. 

where Spain holds additional African territory (Fig. 80). From that 
point and from Dakar in French West Africa there would be short 
steamer connection with South American ports. The project is one 
that could succeed only after agreement with Francs. 

At the present time the rivalry between Spain and the United America 
States is limited almost entirely to the field of Latin American trade. *"^ ^^^'° 
Spain perhaps desires nothing else so much as to maintain commercial 
and spiritual bonds between Spanish America and herself. But 
her path in this direction is beset with many difficulties. In Mexico, 
for example, Spaniards are almost as much disliked as Americans. 
Spain depends upon the United States for cotton and in part for her 
coal, petroleum, lumber, and wheat, and this dependence has tended 
to keep alive commercial relations, which were developing rapidly 
between the countries just before the World War. Between 1912 and 
1917 the general trade of Spain had increased but 25 per cent in value, 
while imports from the United States had increased 400 per cent. 

As a neutral, Spain made large profits on war supplies. Gold flowed 
into the country in a steady stream. The output of coal of all 
grades increased from 4,400,000 long tons in 1914 to 7,200,000 hi 1918. 
Water-power resources are being developed. The electrification of some 
of the railways has been begun. In spite of internal difficulties, the 
economic situation of the country is better than at any time since 1898. 



Present 
prosperity 



CHAPTER SEVEN 



Anti- 
monarch- 
ist rising 



Leader- 
ship with- 
out public 
opinion 



PORTUGAL'S COLONIAL POLICIES 

Portugal was in the midst of a period of national and colonial recon- 
struction when the war came in 1914 to add to her already complex 
problems. There had been grave dissatisfaction with the govern- 
ment, nominally a constitutional monarchy, but in reality a reac- 
tionary oligarchy headed by the king. In 1903 an insurrection of 
peasants took place at Fundao, and in the same year there were 
riots at Coimbra and a strike of weavers at Oporto. In 1908 King 
Carlos and the Crown Prince were assassinated and Prince Manoel 
succeeded to the throne, only to flee to England for safety in 1910. 
The corruption of the public service and the poverty of the over- 
taxed peasant and artisan classes had at last ended in revolution. 

For many years the country had also suffered the difficulties of ad- 
ministering large and remote colonial possessions, which were so 
inefficiently managed as to require heavy annual subsidies for their 
maintenance. Portuguese administrators were weak; for the most 
part the colonies had an unhealthful climate; there was no capital 
for colonial development. The political and economic situation of 
Portugal was bad from every standpoint when the republic was pro- 
claimed in 1910. 

THE PROBLEMS OF THE NEW DEMOCRACY 

Among the new policies of Portugal as framed by the present leaders, 
there are two items of special importance : (1) the separation 
of church and state, and (2) a larger degree of autonomy for the 
provinces and colonies of Portugal. But the country is far from 
unity in the matter of general policy, being broken up into nearly a 
dozen political parties, all struggling for the success of special and, 
on the whole, narrow programs of political and economic reconstruc- 
tion. 

The leaders of the political parties and their principal followers 
have very little in common with the mass of the people. Each party 
includes only a small minority of the electorate. With a popula- 
tion of 6,000,000, of whom 67 per cent live in the country, the ques- 
tions of taxes and wages, of the price of crops and the improvement 
of transportation lines, appear to the people to be of far more im- 
portance than the political programs. The gulf between people 
and leaders is a matter of more importance by reason of a degree of 
illiteracy higher than anywhere else in western Europe. According 

156 



Portugal's Colonial Policies 157 

to the census of 1911, tlie figures are 81 per cent for the women and 67 
per cent for the men. 

It has been said that Portugal's chief export is peasants. Emi- Portu- 
gration became a serious factor between 1890 and 1900, and even ^®!® *"^' 
today adds 60,000 Portuguese annually to the population of Brazil. Save"* 
There is no money for the development of the land, and Portugal is ^'°^^*'" 
chiefly agricultural. Capital cannot be made available for industries, 
of which the country has long felt the need and which would absorb 
the natural increase of population. 

Only a third of the land of Portugal is cultivated, since much of it Portu- 
on the east, along the common boundary with Spain, is too rugged g^rs do- 
for extensive cultivation, and elsewhere there are high moorlands too need's*" 
cold for agriculture and, in the south, regions too dry without irri- 
gation. In all, 28 per cent is forest and 27 per cent pasture. 

It was natural that Portugal should join with the western AUies Portugars 
in the World War, for she is traditionally friendly with England interests 
and she is dependent to a large degree upon imported coal and wheat ""^^^"^^ 
and upon her relatively extensive fisheries. She was not placed, 
Hke Switzerland and Holland, where a lucrative trade with Germany 
could be carried on. Nor did she care to lose her colonies, which in 
the future may have more value to her than in the past, consider- 
ing their supply of the raw materials needed by the industrial 
populations of the world. The pressure of Germany on the Afri- 
can colonies of Portugal had become embarrassing before the war, 
and it was feared that Germany was only waiting her time to absorb 
Portuguese East Africa. Indeed, Germany had ah-eady absorbed 
the so-called Kionga triangle (Fig. 263), about 400 square miles, south 
of the estuary of the Rovuma River. This danger is now removed ; 
the Kionga triangle is restored to Portugal, and her ownership of her 
African colonies has been confirmed by the active part which she 
took in the fighting in Southwest Africa and in East Africa and by 
the help which she gave elsewhere through her army and fleet. 



THE EXPANSION OF PORTUGAL 

There is thus brought to an end the long dechne in the extent of the ^^^^^ ^f 
Portuguese overseas territories, which, at the beginning of the 19th cobiSa/* 
century, formed a larger colonial empire than that held by any other p°'''''^°°' 
European power except Great Britain and Spain. These are now 
her possessions : 



158 



The New World 



Historical 
view of 
Portuguese 
colonial 
policy 



Close his- 
torical and 
commercial 
relations 
with Brazil 



In India 

Goa 

Daman 

(Damao) 

Diu 

In China 
Macao 



In Melanesia 
Eastern Timor, with 
tributary island 
and district 



In Africa 
Cape Verde Islands 
St. Thomas (Sao Thome) and 

Princes (Principe) Islands 
Portuguese Guinea 
Angola (Portuguese West Africa) 
Mozambique (Portuguese East 

Africa) 

The earlier history of Portuguese colonization illuminates the whole 
modern period of Portuguese colonial development. The Portuguese 
were the leaders in pioneering the sea road along the western coast 
of Africa, even before the discoveiy of America. By twice defeat- 
ing the Mohammedan fleets, Portugal confirmed her hold upon the 
trade of India, which she had developed after Vasco da Gama com- 
pleted his voyage to India in 1498. She had broken the old route 
between Europe and India by way of the Persian Gulf and greatly ob- 
structed the commerce of the Red Sea, and she stood at the Atlantic 
gateway of the Mediterranean. With Spain she had divided the 
New World by the treaty of Tordesillas (1494) and subsequent agree- 
ments, receiving the lands east of a north-south line 370 leagues west 
of the Cape Verde Islands ; she thus acquired Brazil and confu-med 
her right to her possessions in Africa and India, including Ceylon and 
Persia. In 1500 King Emanuel assumed the title, two years later 
confirmed by the Pope, of "Lord of the Conquest, Navigation, and 
Commerce of India, Ethiopia, Arabia, and Persia." 

Relations with Brazil 

The relations of the Portuguese to their settlements in Brazil are of 
more importance today than the colonial possessions of Portugal in 
Africa, for here we have real intimacy between a new country of 25,- 
000,000 inhabitants and the home country with 6,000,000 inhabitants. 
Not only in the late colonial period but in all the years that have 
followed, down to the present, there has been in general heavy emi- 
gration from Portugal to Brazil. Moreover, there is in Brazil a 
sympathy for Portugal that has important commercial consequences. 

The colony of Brazil was not only the most important one that 
Portugal possessed; it was also the best founded of the Hispanic 
colonies, owing to the fact that agricultural products of a tropical 
variety, chiefly sugar, were the early economic basis of the colony, 
and not gold and silver, as in the case of the Spanish possessions. 

It was an accident that led to the Portuguese discovery of Brazil 
in 1500. Cabral, a Portuguese navigator, in laying his course for 



Portugal's Colonial Policies 159 

southern Africa and India , took advantage of the trade winds to go Early his- 
well to the westward, and thus came upon the Brazihan coast. Settle- !?'"'' °* 

^ Portuguese 

ment was desultory and development neglected at first, and at one settlement 
time Brazil was even thought worth so little that it might be aban- 
doned. The colony was held in light esteem because the tide of de- 
velopment set toward India during the period of the discovery and 
early settlement of Brazil. It was only after India had been lost to 
the Portuguese that they turned their attention to the development 
of Brazil. 

For three hundred years the efforts of the colonists were confined Later 
almost exclusively to sugar growing. Interest in the colony increased ^^^^°^'^ 
very rapidly after the discovery of gold in Minas Geraes during the 
early years of the 18th century and of diamonds in 1730. The im- 
mediate effect on agriculture was bad, because men were drawn away 
from the plantations and their interest in agriculture was diminished. 
The ultimate effect was to broaden their outlook and open up the inte- 
rior. The colony also gained great impetus in Napoleon's time, when 
the Portuguese crown was transferred to Brazil. Rio de Janeiro be- 
came the real capital of the Portuguese Empire, and the royal family 
arrived there in 1808. But in 1822 the Brazilian democratic leaders 
proclaimed the independence of the country, recognized by the 
mother country in 1825. Thereafter Brazil had an imperial form 
of government until the revolution of 1889 and the proclamation 
of a republic. 

But so closely connected were the peoples of Brazil and Portugal, Limitation 
and their differences of opinion had so much the character of a limited °^ ^°'^*"" 

^ guese com- 

family quarrel, that there has been no real interruption of relations, merciai 
either social or commercial. In fact, the relations would be far more 
close today if it were not for the fact that Portugal is economically 
weak and small, and cannot assist Brazil in the development of its 
resources. Such development has come from Great Britain, France? 
Germany, and the United States, all of which have made great de- 
mands upon Brazil's tropical and subtropical products in their in- 
dustries. The result has been to diminish the effective participation 
of Portugal in the economic development of Brazil. 

The African Colonies 

In eastern Africa, Portugal found it necessary to overcome the Portugal 
Arabs, who by the 10th century had occupied the scacoast as far south ij» East 
as Sofala. After the conquest of the Arabs, Portugal had developed 
a trade between eastern Africa and Arabia, the Persian Gulf, and 



160 



The New World 



Portuguese 
control of 
Indian 
outposts 



Loss of 

Portuguese 
colonies 




to 1*0 i 



India. Like the Portuguese 
who came after them, the 
Arabs occupied the coastland 
rather than inland points. By 
1510 the Portuguese were mas- 
ters of aU that portion of the 
eastern African coast formerly 
held by the Arab sultans. 

The contest between the 
Portuguese and the Arabs in 
eastern Africa but continued 
the struggle that had lasted so 
long in the Iberian peninsula 
and in Africa against the in- 
fidel Mohammedans. The his- 
toric city of Goa, a Portuguese 
settlement in India, stood op- 
posed to Aden, which was in 
Arab possession. In the con- 
test between these two central 
posts of rival religions and 
political faiths we have a repetition in Albuquerque's time (the first 
part of the 16th century) of the early struggles of Portugal and 
Spain against the Mohammedans in the west. By establishing 
themselves in India the Portuguese made rich trade connections with 
farther India, China, and the Orient generally. 

With the decline of Portuguese power at home and abroad, the 
Arabs won back, in the early years of the 18th century, all their African 
possessions north of Cape Delgado, and the Dutch, French, and British 
invaded Portuguese territory in the south. Between 1737 and 1740 
Portuguese commerce was practically swept from the sea by Arab 
parties and rival European powers. A state of warfare among the 
inland tribes prevented effective Portuguese administration in the 
region lying behind the coastal strip ; and with the explorations of 
Livingstone in the Zambesi basin (1850-1865) the British were led to 
establish settlements in the interior at the southern end of Lake 
Nyasa and in the Shire highlands. Thereupon the pressure became 
continuously greater, and when the scramble for Africa was over 
Portugal held only a part of her former domain. 

On the west coast of Africa, however, Portuguese Angola was 
held with little serious rivalry from neighboring colonial powers. For 



Fig. 82. Portuguese navigators were the first to ex- 
plore the west coast of Africa and to conquer the 
Arabs of the east coast, particularly at Zanzibar. 
They were also the first to plant European settle- 
ments in distant India, where they still have Goa, 
Diu, and Damao. BrazU was lost in 1822. Colonial 
administration was so inefficient as late as 1914, 
that Portugal was in danger of losing even Angola 
and Mozambique. Reforms are now in progress. 



Portugal's Colonial Policies 161 

one thing, the Portuguese were the first claimants, having discovered 
and explored the coastal region from 1482 to 1485. The natives 
were in part reduced to submission (a process that ended only in 1907) ; 
Loanda was founded in 1576, Benguela in 1617. Prosperity was de- 
pendent upon the slave trade with Brazil. The frontiers were vague 
and brought boundary disputes with Great Britain, France, and Ger- 
many, until the period from 1885 to 1905, when successive agree- 
ments, treaties, and arbitral awards fixed the boundaries as shown in 
Figure 82. 

THE COLONIAL POLICY OF PORTUGAL 

Devoted to the maintenance of a powerful navy and an active seacoast 
commerce, Portugal's colonial activity was always governed by the possessions 
principle that the seacoast should be held, rather than large ter- 
ritories that would require the sending of troops inland. Thus 
throughout the 16th century her settlements were confined to the 
coasts of Asia, Africa, and America, and the policy followed has 
had its efi'ect down to the present time. There was no real develop- 
ment of the native and of the resources of the land. 

Contributing to the loss of the colonial possessions was the weak- oecUne of 
ness of the whole Portuguese economic system. The merchants colonial 

, power 

and bankers of Portugal sought to increase the amount of gold in the 
country rather than to increase the industrial output. This line 
of economic theory led to a decline of agriculture and the increased 
importation of raw materials which might have been produced at 
home, at least in part. Portugal soon became, commercially, a mere 
appanage of England. 

The home industries of Portugal have not grown at the same rate as Portuguese 
those of other western European countries. Hence the colonies ^rLa. or 
have been of less value to the people of Portugal itself than to other Mozam- 
powers, particularly Germany, which had a large commercial fleet 
and weU-established industries. Portuguese East Africa, for example, 
with its population of more than 3,000,000 and with the ports of 
Lourenzo Marquez, Mozambique, and Beira, has great capacities for 
the production and export of sugar cane, rice, coffee, rubber, and to- 
bacco, as well as cotton and coconuts, and a part of it is high enough 
to produce wheat and cattle. There are also large deposits of coal 
and some of copper. The trade of the colony was artificially stimu- 
lated in 1909, when Portugal signed an agreement with the Transvaal 
government which gave Delagoa Bay more than half the import 
trade of the Transvaal ; in return the Transvaal obtained the privi- 



162 



The New World 



Economic 
importance 
of Angola 



The two 
principal 
colonial 
problems 



German 
penetra- 
tion in 
Portuguese 
East 
Africa 



lege of recruiting natives in Portuguese East Africa to work in the 
Rand mines. 

Under tlie Portuguese the West African colony, Angola (Fig. 82), 
has developed hardly at all. It is of small present importance, yet 
it may ultimately develop into a rich and powerful colony. Its popu- 
lation is estmiated at 2,000,000 and its area (485,000 square miles) is 
as great as that of Texas, Cahfornia, and Washington combined. 
The coastal belt is in general dry ; but with increasing altitude at the 
inner edge of the coastal plain, from thirty to a hundred miles from the 
sea, there is heavier rainfall and abundant vegetation. Then follows 
a relatively unproductive plateau with scattered vegetation and a 
more moderate water supply ; tliis merges eastward into the forested 
basins of the Congo and the Zambesi, while in the south it runs into 
a barren sandy desert. The coastal region is rich in oil palms, and 
at the extreme north are dense forests of economic value. Some 
rubber is gathered from the wild rubber plants. Sugar, cotton, coffee, 
and tobacco, together with rubber, pahn oil, cattle, hides, ivory, and 
gum, are the chief exports. The two most important conunercial 
towns are Loanda and Cabinda, the latter the outlet for an enclave of 
Portuguese territory, surrounded by the French and the Belgian Congo. 

^^^lile the colonies have required a subsidy, on the other hand 
there have been commercial compensations. By tariff and trade 
regulations much of the colonial produce was brought to Portugal, 
chiefly to Lisbon, and there reexported. Two serious pohtical and 
commercial difficulties were constantly feared : 

(1) As the colonies wished to trade wherever they chose, and since 
Great Britain and Germany were the two powers by whom the 
products were carried, tliere was fear that the colonies might 
be taken over by one or the other of these two powers if they 
were to trade freely with them. 

(2) If the colonies were given self-govermnent, foreign capital 
would increasingly divert the colonial products and Lisbon 
would lose a large part of its trade. 

These dangers were the more real because the value of raw ma- 
terials, such as the rubber, copra, cotton, and hides of the Portuguese 
African possessions, was increasing constantly with the rapid increase 
in the trade and industry of the world. Neglected for a time, Portu- 
guese possessions have become an object of envy to stronger powers. 
Germany bought more Portuguese colonial produce than any other 
power, particularly cacao, coffee, and rubber (from Sao Thome and 
Principe chiefly). And Germany still needs these things more than 



PortugaVs Colonial Policies 



163 




164 The New World 

any other power, and now has no colonies of her own on which to 
depend for a supply. German financial influence in Lisbon is likely 
to continue. 

The government of the republic has made "colonial self-govern- 
ment" a part of its program. This it had to do, for a revolutionary 
spirit was active in the colonies, especially in Angola ; the colonists 
felt that their backward condition was due to political and economic 
dependence upon the home country. In 1912 each colony was given 
a separate budget and a separate subsidy, where a subsidy was neces- 
sary. 
Colonial ^Y ^ dccrcc dated 10 May 1919, Portugal granted extensive auton- 

seif-gov- omy to her colonies and promised administrative reform in continua- 
tion of her earlier declaration of 1914. State aid was promised to 
settlers, and expert agricultural and geological investigations were 
to be encouraged. These promises of reform and development were 
probably made to offset the desire of other states to benefit by 
Portuguese misgovernment. The Union of South Africa wishes to 
acquire Portuguese East Africa, or at least Lourenzo Marquez, and 
Belgium would like to secure northern Angola in order to lengthen 
the coast line of the Belgian Congo. Universal discontent in the 
colonies plays into the hands of outside powers. 

Certainly improvements in colonial management are much needed. 
The colonies could furnish food needed by Portugal if transport by 
sea and land were available. About 30,000 natives annually leave 
Mozambique to work in the Transvaal gold fields. In 1916 the 
government deficit of Angola alone was $30,000,000. 

More intensive agricultural cultivation of a modern type, the build- 
ing up of home industries to absorb colonial products, the stabilization 
of her political processes, — these are vital needs for Portugal. By 
successfully meeting them she can keep her colonies and can become 
a powerful country again ; if she loses her colonies, she will continue 
to rank as a declining power. 



1 



CHAPTER EIGHT 

THE SCANDINAVIAN COUNTRIES AND HOLLAND 

One of the most striking conditions of the World War was the per- The neu- 
sistent neutrahty of four northern European states, — Holland and the scSi^avia 
three Scandinavian countries, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. Each 
of them provided Germany with large quantities of foodstuffs and raw 
materials needed for the conduct of the war ; yet each of them suffered 
the loss of lives and ships by German submarines, against whose use 
they frequently protested. However, because of their small size 
they felt unable to do more than protest. The Scandinavian coun- 
tries carried their dependence upon each other to the significant point 
of making an agreement during the war to take no part on either side 
unless the three of them unanimously approved such action in ad- 
vance. 

In the future we shall find these four states playing an important a possible 
part in international agreements affecting the North Sea and, more co^^g^gj^- 
particularly, the Baltic. A possible Baltic Confederation would be of tion 
interest to all of them. For hundreds of years one nation after an- 
other owning a part of the Baltic coast has sought a dominating posi- 
tion on that sea. Four hundred years ago Denmark was the leading 
Baltic power. Later Sweden won preeminence, only to lose it to 
Russia. With the rise of her naval power in recent years, Germany 
held a superior position. The natural currents of trade in the Baltic 
basin require cooperation of the Baltic powers. Russia exports 
chiefly to Germany ; Sweden exports to Russia and Germany ; Den- 
mark is a way station on the sea road eastward; Finland, like Nor- 
way, will have a large trade with England, but of more importance 
to her will be her trade with Esthonia, Sweden, and Germany. 

On 9 June 1920 there was held at Copenhagen a "Baltic and White 
Sea Conference" in which eleven nations participated. Germany 
was invited to the conference, and Russia was represented by non- 
Bolshevist agents. America was not represented at all. The confer- 
ence took up questions of working hours, equality of trade in the 
Baltic and North Sea shipping, and the matter of rebates. 

The virihty of the Scandinavians is well known. Their men and scandi- 
women are physically strong and healthy. The northern cHmate, a nayian tra- 

.. IP • . 1 iT/>«i. PI. ditions of 

nigh level ot success m overcoming the natural difficulties of their power 
environment, excellent maritime traditions — these have bred a whole- 
some race that has left its mark in history. Norwegian kings once 
ruled the northern Scottish islands. The Danes once held nearly 

165 



166 



The New World 



INHABITANTS 

per sq. mile persqkm 




Scale of miles 
Danzia(yi°°,,, Bo ,, q 'gg — 



Fig. 84. The population of the Scandinavian peninsula is largely limited to a seacoast belt, 
except in the southern portion. The capital city of each of the three Scandinavian countries 
and of Finland is a salt-water port. Danzig will become Poland's maritime outlet. Riga ia 
the capital of Latvia. Memel, between Danzig and Riga, may become Lithuania's sole port. 
Sea-borne trade is of interest to all, and Baltic agreements are likely to be made in the common 
interest. 



The Scandinavian Countries and Holland 



167 



all of England and the lowlands of 
Scotland. The English and the 
French prayer-books long con- 
tained an echo of those far times in 
the petition, "From the fury of the 
Northmen, good Lord, deliver us." 
The extent of the realm of Gus- 
tavus Adolphus, the greatest of the 
Scandinavian kings, is shown in Fig- 
ure 85. The colonial enterprise of 
the Danes led to the establishment 
of colonies in Greenland, Africa, 
the Faroes, and the West Indies, t, o^ r^, o j- 1. . , . 

^ . IT 1 Fig. 85. The Swedish state at the time of its 

It was only m 1917, by Sellmg the greatest extent. The first date in each case 

Virmn T«lflTirl« tn tViA TTnUc^rl Cifot-.o represents the year in which the district was 

V irgm islands to tne Umted btateS, won ; the date in parenthesis, the year in which 

that the Danes grave up the last of ^* ^^^ ^°^*- ^^^^ Putzger, Histonsche Schui. 

, . . . , Vwr -r ,. ^^^«^. 1906, PI. 25. 

tneir possessions m the West Indies. 




THE SCANDINAVIAN PENINSULA 

If we turn to the commercial power of Scandinavia, we shall find 
some noteworthy facts. In proportion to her population, Sweden 
has a greater railway mileage than any other country in Europe. Nor- 
way possessed more than 4 per cent of the world's shipping in 1914, 
though her population numbered only 2,600,000, or less than 0.2 
per cent of the world's total. Norwegian sailors are known the 
world over. Norway has forests of great extent, and fisheries upon 
which millions outside her own frontiers depend for sea-food. Sweden 
has a vast supply of timber (Fig. 87), and the development of her iron 
mines in recent years has made her one of the great iron-exporting 
countries of Europe. Though both countries extend far to the north, 
it is in the southern section that their chief populations dwell (Fig. 84). 

The main topographic axis of the Scandinavian peninsula lies close 
to the western side. Between the cold, rocky highlands and the sea 
is a very narrow fringe of country where more than 80 per cent of the 
people of Norway live (Fig. 84). Norway has but 4400 square miles 
of territory under cultivation. Rivers and lakes cover 4 per cent of 
the total area, as compared with an average of 0.5 per cent for Eu- 
rope. Three fourths of the land is unproductive, and a fifth is forest- 
covered. Essentially a maritime nation, Norway has from the first 
been dependent upon open sea routes. 

On the other hand, Sweden dwells on the eastern or long back slope 



Commercial 
impor- 
tance of 
Scandinavia 



Geo- 
graphical 
position of 
Scandinavia 
and its 
effects 



168 



The New World 




POWER SCALE H.l> 

2.500,000 



lrTuseCl9l2) 



W In reserve 
^^Iron deposits 




2,000.000 



1,500,000 



1,000,000 



■500.000 



(60,000 



Fig. 86. Water power and iron ore. The 
iron ore of northern Sweden, in the famous 
Gellivare district, has opened up a remote 
and thinly populated region. Coal is lacking, 
except in small quantities, and water-power 
development is therefore well advanced. 





Area underforest 
within each district, on 
ttie same scale. as the 
map. 

^'^•■v. District (Ian) boun- 
dary. 



Fig. 87. Lying near highly industrial and 
larger nations in need of raw material, 
Sweden finds her forests a powerful asset. 
From Sweden : Historical and Statistical Hand- 
book, 2d ed., 1914, Vol. II: forests, p. 169; 
iron, p. 243 ; water power, p. 325. 



of the Scandinavian peninsula, and has a greater extent of fertile 
land. Norway and Sweden are also different as to cHmate. East- 
ern Sweden has the dry continental type of climate, while western 
Norway has the mild and moist climate of England. 



The Scandinavian Countries and Holland 169 

In 1814 Norway was taken from Denmark, to which it had been Separation 
joined since 1397, and given to Sweden as compensation for the latter's ^d^onvay 
services in joining the European powers against Napoleon, with whom 
Denmark had become aUied. The union of Sweden and Norway 
lasted until 1905, when a dispute arose over Norway's right to main- 
tain her own consular service. The union was then dissolved without 
resort to arms, in spite of the high feeling aroused. 

These historic estrangements are of far less present importance to 
the people concerned than are the common benefits which they have 
enjoyed by standing together during the past few years. Like the 
rest of the world, the Scandinavian countries have undergone a marked 
change in their political attitude since 1914 ; the old problems seem 
small and remote, and new problems are pressing upon them from 
every side. 

PRESENT PROBLEMS 

Norway is now less concerned over her relations with Sweden than 
with practical international guarantees for the freedom of shipping. 
Sweden no longer fears conquest by an imperial Russia, but she still 
has the vexed question of the future form and conditions of a new 
Russian government. Denmark long lived in fear of German en- 
croachment, and would now welcome an international order in which 
guarantees would be given for existing boundaries and for equality of 
trade privileges. Only Holland stands on an independent basis. She 
is as watchful of the British as of the Germans ; she wiU take no dic- 
tation from either, nor wiU she yield to Belgium on the question of the 
Scheldt or of Dutch Limburg (page 123). 

MARITIME INTERESTS OF NORWAY 

During the World War, Norway lost nearly 2000 sailors ; she lost vital im- 
also torpedoed ships to the number of more than 800, with a capacity fo Nwway 
exceeding 1,000,000 tons. The commercial life of the country was of freedom 
deranged, Norway dropped from fourth to sixth place in mercantile 
tonnage, being replaced by Japan. 

Opposite Norway, across the North Sea, is another maritime 
nation, Great Britain. Their interests are common in many respects. 
Norway, though neutral in the war period, was friendly to the British, 
for she has everything to gain by that extension of the power of 
Anglo-Saxon navies which is imphed in the League of Nations cove- 
nant. She has joined the League of Nations. Under the League, the 
freedom of the seas is guaranteed by the large nations, and the over- 



170 



The New World 




Broivn Bros. 



Norway's 
claim to 
Spitsbergen 



Fig. 88. Adde and the Suf jord on the Norwegian coast. Note the presence of flat land in the 
foreground (head of fjord) and the absence of it along the foot of the fjord wall in the distance. 

seas commerce of the small trading nations, like Greece, Norway, 
and Holland, may be expected to grow rapidly as soon as the world 
has become more orderly, when industry is revived and capital is 
made available for the purchase or building of ships. 

Since the trade of Norway will be chiefly between ports in foreign 
lands rather than between Norway and the world, security for goods 
and ships is Norway's principal need. She is not a manufacturing 
nation, except in a very limited way, and she has no vital need for 
colonies. She is satisfied if shipping is free to all flags. 

In the security and ownership of fishing stations near home, how- 
ever, Norway is much interested. Hence she pressed her claim to Spits- 
bergen, a group of islands in the Arctic Sea north of the Scandinavian 



The Scandinavian Countries and Holland 



171 




Brown Bros. 



Fig. 89. Buga, 



jiie of the oldest towns in Norway. Note the crowding of houses on the 
narrow fringe of flat land near the coast. 



peninsula, in which claim her interest is heightened by the rich coal 
seams that outcrop on the main island, Norway herself having to im- 
port all her coal from overseas, chiefly from England. Ever since 
1261 Norway has periodically asserted her claims to Spitsbergen, as in 
1608, when the British began whaling off the islands, in 1666, when 
France did likewise, and in 1679, Sweden. The archipelago has been 
explored chiefly by Norwegian navigators. 

The Norwegians already have wireless and meteorological stations at 
Green Harbor and a meteorological station on Bear Island. They have 
established fur stations; they have maintained regular navigation 
between Spitsbergen and Norway (since 1911) ; and they own the two 
largest of the four coal companies in the islands, with a production in 



172 



The New World 



Guarantees 
secured 
trom 
Korway 




^^e<^^c^\3ev\\\\\\\\\■ 



1918 of more than 50,000 
tons. Norway has other- 
wise no fuel except wood 
and no native source of 
power save the "white 
coal" of her waterfalls. 

In recent years there 
have also been developed 
in Spitsbergen a whale- 
oil industry and general 
fisheries of importance. 
Though far north, — 
halfway between Nor- 
way and the North Pole, 
— the islands benefit 
by the warm Atlantic 
waters that drift right 
up to the Arctic Ocean, 
past the northern end of 
Norway, and create open 
winter ports even as far 
east as the Murman 
coast of Russia (Fig. 90) . 
In order to put an end to the status of non-ownership, the Allied 
and Associated Powers have put Spitsbergen under the Norwegian flag, 
but Norway does not receive the islands in unlimited sovereignty. 

The Alhed and Associated Powers have laid down certain specific 
guarantees. These affect only nations having actual vested in- 
terests in Spitsbergen at the present time, and direct the manner in 
which new commercial interests may be acquired. There is to be no 
naval base in the islands, and no use of Spitsbergen in time of war. 
The Danish government is to represent Russia's interests in the islands 
until that country gets on its feet again. The ships of aU signatories 
to the Spitsbergen treaty are to enjoy fishing and hunting privileges 
in territorial waters. All ships are to ,be enabled to touch at some 
point in Norway on the way to or from Spitsbergen. Wireless stations 
are to be at the service of all, and an international meteorological 
station may be established. A Danish commissioner will examine 
aU claims now outstanding, and final settlement is to be made by a 

^ By Spitsbergen are meant also Bear Island and all other islands between 10° and 35° 
longitude east of Greenwich and 74° and 81° north latitude. 



Fig. 90. Spitsbergen in relation to Norway. The group is 
now under Norwegian sovereignty, after an indefinite status 
and the expression of political or economic interest by both 
Great Britain and Russia. 



The Scandinavian Countries and Holland 173 

tribunal of the interested powers, with the commissioner as presi- 
dent. 

Sweden's foreign problems 

Sweden's foreign problems have arisen largely from her long-stand- Sweden and 
ing fear of Russia. In 1809 Russia took from her the country of ^"^^'* 
Finland, thus removing a barrier between Sweden and the growing 
power of the Russian state. The reestablishment of Finland as an 
independent state (page 370) will free Sweden from dread of Russia. 

The evidence of Russian power took its most menacing form in The Aland 
possession of the Aland Islands, which are only seventy-five miles ^^^*°<*s 
from Stockholm, and if fortified by an enemy power would prove a 
real menace to Sweden. Fortified by Russia early in the World War, 
they were temporarily occupied late in the war by the German fleet. 
Because Russia had broken up into a number of separate states, among 
which was Finland, and because of Allied recognition of Finnish in- 
dependence, it was thought possible to settle the Aland question by 
direct negotiation between Finland and Sweden (1919). This plan 
failing, the matter Avas referred to the League of Nations, with the result 
that the case was studied by an Interallied commission for report 
and eventual settlement by the League. The Soviet government on 
its part also protested against any agreement regarding the islands to 
which Russia was not a party. 

DENMARK 

Denmark's position gives it special importance in relation to the com- 
merce of the Baltic, for its chief city, Copenhagen, is located on the is- 
land of Zealand, which borders the gateway to that sea. At one point 
the water passage is but three miles wide. Down to 1857 Denmark 
actually collected dues on cargoes passing through the "Sound," as 
the strait is called. Denmark's right to levy dues was always pro- 
tested by other countries — in the 17th century by the Netherlands 
and Sweden and in the 19th century by the United States. For re- 
linquishing the privilege Denmark was paid $20,000,000, of which sum 
more than a fourth was supplied by Great Britain. 

The commercial welfare of Denmark depends largely upon the 
growing export of dairy products and the facilities ofi'ered by the free 
port and bonded warehouses of Copenhagen. ^ Denmark's geograph- 

^ Recently the free port of Copenhagen has been doubled in size, larger warehouses have 
been constructed, and every effort has been made to take advantage of its position as a port 
of call for steamers in the Baltic trade. These efforts were largely offset by a succession 
of strikes during 1920 and the ensuing diversion of trade. 



174 



The New World 



Present 
colonial 
possessions 
of Denmark 



Scandi- 
navian in- 
terest in 
German 
recon- 
struction 



ical position fosters close relations between its merchants and those 
of Germany and the United Kingdom. Its agricultural products 
(three fourths of the land is in farms) find a ready market in the 
industrial centers of its large neighbors. 

Denmark's colonies were never commercially important. The Vir- 
gin Islands, its only West Indian possession, were sold to the United 
States in 1917 for $25,000,000 (Fig. 272). By virtue of explorations 
in Greenland, chiefly by Peary and Greely, the United States had 
certain vague rights there, all of which were given up as part of the 
general agreement whereby the Virgin Islands were acquired. Green- 
land, Denmark's sole remaining colony, has little commerce at pres- 
ent, its exports being fish, skins, seal oil, feathers, and small amounts 
of copper ore ; but it is capable of some development and may ulti- 
mately have wireless telegraph stations of importance in commerce 
and war. On 1 December 1918 Iceland, a Danish possession, became 
nominally a sovereign state, though Denmark represents it in foreign 
affairs and is united to it in the person of the Danish king. 

Norway and Sweden, Hke Denmark, are now most anxious to favor 
a policy that wiU re-create the industrial life of Germany, start ships 
moving in her ports, and renew her industries. • They are Germany's 
neighbors, and their trade with that state has been an important part 
of their total commerce. \Miatever they may have thought or done 
with respect to the issues of the war, the Scandinavian states cannot 
be expected to look with ill favor upon a more active merchant fleet 
in the Baltic and the renewal of the commerce and industry of the 
whole tributary region. 



Denmark's 
Alsace- 
Lorraine 



TERRITORIAL GAINS IN SLESVIG 

The principal Danish-speaking portions of Slesvig have been 
returned to Denmark. The case grew out of former German ambi- 
tions. Until 1864 the duchies of Slesvig and Holstein were joined in 
a personal union under their duke, although Holstein was also a 
member of the German Confederation (from which in part the 
German Empire was formed in 1871). The two duchies were pre- 
dominantly German, except for the northern part of Slesvig, which 
contained about 150,000 Danes and a few Frisians (Fig. 91). The 
Germans saw that it would be possible to dig a canal from Kiel to the 
mouth of the Elbe which would give German ships a direct passage 
between the North Sea and the Baltic. With the Kiel Canal in German 
hands, the German fleet could not be bottled up in the Baltic so 
readily, should war eventually come. 



The Scandinavian Countries and Holland 



175 



Consequently, in 1863, 
when the Duke of Sles- 
vig and Holstein came 
to the throne of Den- 
mark as Christian IX 
and attempted to unite 
both provinces to his 
kingdom, Denmark was 
invaded by Prussia and 
Austria, the two princi- 
pal members of the Ger- 
man Confederation. 
After a short campaign, 
Christian was forced to 
surrender Slesvig and 
Holstein (1864). Two 
years later, however, 
Prussia and Austria 
came to blov/s about 
the disposition of the 
region. Prussia was vic- 
torious. She forthwith 



SLESVIG 

_— — Boundary of 19/4 

•Boundary of 
plebiscite areas 
Boundary of 1320 

I 1 Danes 

Germans 
k\\^M Mixed, Danes 
^ ^"^^^ --I and Germans 

Frisians 




The Ger- 
manization 
of Slesvig 



Fig. 91. Language boundaries in Slesvig according to Danish 
authority (Clausens, 1912) . The northern plebiscite zone voted 
to join Denmark; the southern zone (between the dotted line 
and the solid one, except where the latter is bordered by dots) 
annexed the duchies and '^oted to remain German. The final boundary is shown by the 

heavy solid line. It differs from the plebiscite boundary only 
began a campaign OI in detail, as at Pattburg and south of Alsen island— adjust- 
Germanization that con- J^eTeoti?'"''^ *° ^^""'^ disturbing the industrial relations of 

tinned without cessa- 
tion until the beginning of the war in 1914. Between 1867 and 
1895, there emigrated from the small territory of north Slesvig 57,000 
persons. In 1898 about 1000 persons were expelled from the country. 
The Prussians made homeless those who had declared their inten- 
tion to settle in Denmark, an act of oppression which contravened 
a privilege granted by the treaty of Vienna in 1864. All the chiL 
dren of those parents who declared their intention of returning to 
Denmark were forbidden to marry, and as soon as they married 
were expelled from the country. The Germans also obliged many 
purely Danish parishes to adopt German church services and forcibly 
colonized much of the land, giving state aid and more favorable terms 
of payment to Germans. 

In the treaty of peace which defeated Austria signed with Prussia 
in 1866, it was stipulated that the inhabitants of northern Slesvig 
should have the right to decide by a free vote whether or not they 



176 The New World 

would unite themselves to Denmark. This plebiscite was always 
deferred by Germany. By the terms of the treaty of peace between 
the Allied and Associated Powers and Germany at the close of the 
World War, arrangements were made for. the plebiscite. The region 
was divided into two parts, a northern district voting as a whole, 
and a central district voting by conmiunes. The northern district has 
about 1500 square miles and 165,000 people, and in February 1920 
three fourths of its inhabitants voted that the region return to Den- 
mark. The vote in the southern district, taken March 1920, resulted 
in an even greater majority in favor of Germany. The principal town 
of this zone is Flensburg, which voted almost solidly for German own- 
ership. Neither side, of course, is completely satisfied. The Danes 
would like to have Flensburg, and the Germans want Tondern, a small 
district in the northern zone which voted for Germany, but which is 
now assigned to Denmark. The southern boundary of Denmark as 
finally drawn is shown in Figure 91. 

HOLLAND 

Dutch HoUand, with 12,582 square miles of territory, is a mere spot on the 

colonial j^g^p -j^ comparison with her colonial possessions, whose total area is 
783,000 square miles. Of this area, 737,000 is in the Malay Archipelago 
of the East Indies (Fig. 254). The Dutch West Indian possessions, 
including Dutch Guiana on the mainland of South America, have an 
area of 46,000 square miles and a population of 90,000. HoUand has a 
population but little in excess of 6,700,000, while her East Indian 
colonies have 47,000,000. The island of Java, a Dutch colony, is the 
most densely populated land mass in the world. It is noteworthy that 
all of Holland's colonies are in the tropics. They thus supplement 
the products of Holland and have long formed the basis for an im- 
portant trade with Germany and Great Britain. Through their use 
of cheap Malay labor and their development of the plantation system, 
the Dutch laid the foundations of colonial success. 
Colonial Coffee and sugar culture in the Dutch East Indies have long had a 

^° '^^ vital relation to Dutch prosperity. More recently the production of 

plantation rubber has brought huge amounts of foreign capital and a 
fresh hold upon international trade. As far as treatment of natives 
goes, the Dutch "culture" system was at first absolutely ruthless and 
native exploitation became a highly developed art. Famine and pesti- 
lence resulted, and at last the system, which was virtually slavery, 
was abolished for one that provided for at least theoretically free 
labor. To make labor really free in the Dutch East Indies will be one 



The Scandinavian Countries arid Holland 



111 




178 



The New World 



Holland's 

foreign 

policy 



Territorial 
disputes 
with 
Belgium 



ILands reclaimed 
from the sea 




pGhenti 



of the problems to which the 
signatories of the Labor Con- 
vention will be compelled to 
address themselves in the near 
future. 

The results of Dutch ac- 
tivity in the East have been 
excellent in other fields. The 
topographic surveys are of high 
52] grade and, along with scientific 
expeditions to little-known in- 
terior regions, have opened up 
valuable lands to future de- 
velopment. Telegraph lines, 
cables, lighthouses, and free 



Fig. 93. The struggle for land in Holland. After harborS haVC prOmotcd trade. 

?u Jf stiild Tgtr^'l' Havdhoek der Aardrijks- pjracy has bccu all but sup- 
pressed, and the benefits of 
orderly government have been extended to peoples once lawless. 

The conditions of life in Holland have created an intense interest 
in the principle of the freedom of the seas and the security of distant 
colonies held by the smaller powers. Threatened by the growth of 
Germany's submarine fleet, Holland could scarcely hope for German 
success. At the same time, she could not forget her historic naval 
defeat at the hands of the British, the colonies in South Africa that she 
had lost to Great Britain, or the kinship of the Boers who had fought 
in vain against British domination. As long as she was not directly 
threatened, she did not wish to disturb her profitable trade as a neutral 
with needy Germany. With Allied victory safeguarding her colonial 
titles, Holland had only to hold fast to all her European territory to 
come out of the war with relatively small losses. Her shipping and 
commerce had suffered by submarine sinkings and by American and 
British internment, but she had escaped the huge debts of the bel- 
hgerents and their loss of man power. 

We have already reviewed her disputes with Belgium respecting 
Dutch Limburg and the left bank of the Scheldt (page 123). However 
desirable these additions might be for Belgium, their loss was not 
to be thought of by the Dutch. Limburg contains coal deposits, and 
Holland is poor in mineral resources of every sort. The Dutch have 
.a remarkable maritime and commercial history, and they could hardly 
be expected to advantage^ a neighbor at direct loss to themselves. 



The Scandinavian Countries and Holland 



179 




Fig. 94. Rotterdam, the chief Dutch rival of the Belgian port of Antwerp on the Scheldt. 

See Figure 63. 



Antwerp may need the lower Scheldt, but its growth would check the 
development of Rotterdam and other Dutch ports. That Holland's 
course might lead to Belgian enmity was a difficulty hardly to be 
avoided in any case, seeing that Belgium had revolted from Holland in 
1830 and that Belgium's foreign policy favored France while Holland 
was commercially and politically more closely allied to Germany. 

To secure sufficient soil for her people, Holland reclaims the shallow 
sea floor and marshes of the coast. The Dutch have a saying : " God 
made the sea, but man made the land." Vast sums have been ex- 
pended on reclamation projects and more wiU follow if the plan of 
reclaiming part of the Zuider Zee is continued (Fig. 93). These 
efforts have induced an appreciation of land that makes the loss of it, 
in whatever form, appear to be a calamity. 

The lower Scheldt is also vitally related to the whole matter of 
Holland's frontiers. On every side she seeks to develop the strategic 
value of water. A belt of marshes forms the northern third of her 
eastern frontier. The long and indented coast is fringed with shaUow 
water easy to defend. Much of the reclaimed land is pasture and 
could be flooded, if the national defense required it, without destroying 
the principal towns. Like Belgium, the country occupies a highly 
strategic position between larger powers intent on maintaining the 



180 The Neic World 

integrity of a small state which no one of them would like to see 
absorbed by another. 

A third of Holland is pastm-e land in a high state of development. 
She can never rival Belgimn's industrial production, but she has the 
navy, the colonial sources of raw material, and the thrift to develop 
her natural resources and her maritime trade to a high degree. In the 
past half century her industries have grown rapidly in response to her 
desire to be more nearly independent industrially, a desire that she 
could the more easily satisfy because of her colonial supply of raw 
materials — sugar, hemp, vegetable oil, and rubber. 



CHAPTER NINE 

RAILWAY AND TERRITORIAL PROBLEMS OF SWITZERLAND 

At the end of the World War, Switzerland, though a neutral, was 
left with at least three possible sources of trouble : 

(1) International traffic passes through Switzerland on a great intema- 
scale (Fig. 95), and this fact affects the economic and political *'°°^^ 
freedom of the country. The navigation of the Rhine has orswiSL- 

^never been controlled to Switzerland's satisfaction ; and she is land 
also interested in the new Allied purpose of internationalizing 
by treaty certain ports, rivers, and canals. 

(2) The eastern part of the country is German-speaking, the 
western part French, and national opinion is strongly divided 
on questions that affect relations with neighboring states. 

(3) The isolated mountain communities of western Austria, like 
the Vorarlberg, for example, wish to escape the heavy tax 
burdens imposed on Austria by the treaty of St. Germain-en- 
Laye, and to this end plead for admission to the Swiss Con- 
federation as a separate canton or district. 

Because of limited resources and heavy emigration, Switzerland Switzerland 
has grown very slowly by comparison with other central European verTumited 
countries. As much as 28 per cent of the land is unproductive, though resources 
we must count as an asset the scenery, which attracts a heavy and 
profitable tourist travel. There are only 4,000,000 people, and while 
this number represents an increase over earlier years, more than 40 
out of 187 of the political districts have had an actual decrease of 
population. The foreign element has increased despite the heavy 
emigration of the Swiss. Between 1880 and 1910, Italian citizens 
resident in Switzerland increased from 41,000 to 203,000, the greatest 
influx being due to the employment of Italians on railway and tunnel 
construction. They congregate in the cities and live in insanitary 
surroundings, thus increasing the social problems of the government. 

POSITION WITH RELATION TO OTHER COUNTRIES 

An interior, landlocked state, without a seaport, without colonies. Pressure 
a buffer between powerful nations, Switzerland has maintained her gSdss*^* 
independence in spite of aggressive and ambitious neighbors. But government 
the independence or sovereignty of Switzerland is in actual practice oerman^*^ 
limited. For example, take the convention of 1909 between Germany 
and Italy on the one hand and Switzerland on the other, made when the 

181 



182 



The New World 




Fig. 95. The place of Switzerland in the railway net of Europe. Railways with more than 
ten freight trains daily are shown by heavy lines. Railroads from Atlas geograpl.ique et statis- 
tique de la Suisse, 1915, PI. 48, and Docu merits cartographiqucs de geograplde iconomiquc, No. 1913. 



POPULATION DENSITY 




Fig. 96. Switzerland has population (bands conforming to the Alpine valleys) which repre- 
sent in many cases the extremities of similar though broader bands of population in adjacent 
countries. With such a distribution of population, railways are peculiarly important (Fig. 95). 
From Schweizischer Schulatlas. 



Railway and Territorial Problems of Switzerland 183 




Publishers' Photo Service 
Fig. 97. Andermatt, in southern Switzerland near the St. Gotthard Pass, where a railway 
tunnel pierces the southern mountain wall. 



Swiss government proposed to buy from its private owners the St. 
Gotthard railway system, which is a part of the through rail route 
between Germany and Italy, under the famous St. Gotthard pass in 
the Swiss Alps. Germany and Italy objected to the purchase, unless 
Switzerland would promise to allow traffic at the same rates as over 
other parts of the system in Germany and Italy. 

Switzerland protested, but her protests were of no avail until the 
treaty of Versailles was ratified. In the articles governing Rhine 
traffic freedom of access to the sea for Swiss commerce was guaranteed fr"e 
and pressure heretofore brought to bear on Switzerland was removed. *° *^® ^^^ 
In return, however, it was stipulated that there was to be freedom 
of transit across Switzerland for goods and persons of neighboring 
states. 

Late in 1919 railway conferences between German, Swiss, and p^^^^_ 
Italian interests were held at Heidelberg, Germany, and as a result ments with 
the German-Swiss-Italian traffic was in part renewed in the summer of 
1920. 



Swiss com- 
merce now 
guaranteed 
access 



The New World 




Fig. 9S. Interlaken, with the Jungfrau in the background 



Publishers' Photo Service 
a typical Swiss landscape. 



Switzer- 
land the 
interna- 
tional 
country 



The peculiar position of Switzerland among the countries of the 
world is further emphasized by the fact that she has long been the 
refuge of exiled scholars and scientists from the less liberal countries of 
Europe. She has been a center of advanced education and, at times, 
of political plots aimed by exiles at their eneitiies at home. She 
has consistently preserved the rights of asylum, and during the war, 
as well as after it, she permitted numbers of political agents, exiles, 
ex-kings, and the like, to take refuge within her frontiers. 

Switzerland is the home of a number of international organizations 
like the Postal Union and the International Red Cross Society; and 
Geneva has been selected as the seat of the League of Nations. 



Swiss 

political 

tendencies 

toward 

socialism 



POLITICAL TENDENCIES OF SWITZERLAND 

State socialism has gone very far in Switzerland, and it has not 
yet reached its climax there. For nearly thirty years the state has 
had a high revenue from customs duties, with which it has bought 
five great railways, guaranteed work to every able-bodied man, and 
enforced compulsory sickness insurance. 



Railway and Territorial Problems of Switzerland 185 



FRONTIER QUESTIONS 




Swiss op- 
position to 
incorpora- 
tion of the 
Vorarlberg 



Switzerland has had 
no change in bounda- 
ries as a result of the 
war. Nevertheless, she 
faces a territorial prob- 
lem on her eastern 
frontier, in relation to 
the Vorarlberg region 

(rig. J9). Here, in a Fig_ 99. Switzerland and the western provinces of Austria. L. 

number of high Alpine stands for Liechtenstein (enclave of German territory) and V. 

„ . , for Vorarlberg (Austrian). The latter sought unsuccessfully to 

valleys m trie extreme secure union with Switzerland that she might escape the fate 

western DSfft of Austria ^^ Austria under the treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye. 

lives a group of people unwilling to remain a part of the Austrian 
Republic. Shortly after the armistice between the Allies and Austria- 
Hungary in 1918, delegations of Vorarlberg citizens, chiefly workmen 
and innkeepers, sought to secure incorporation of the district into 
Switzerland. This would add about 15,000 German-speaking people 
to the already heavy German majority in Switzerland, besides greatly 
increasing the present Catholic majority. 

Switzerland long opposed the union, though there are the closest 
ties between her eastern districts and western Austria. It would 
increase her debts, for these former citizens of Austria-Hungary could 
not be allowed to escape their part of the heavy Austro-Hungarian 
debt by becoming Swiss citizens. They should pay a share of the 
pre-war debts, the war debts, and the so-called Rliine dues formerly 
paid by Austria. The people of Vorarlberg have sought union with 
Germany also. 

Happily, the long-standing claim of Italy to the Ticino, a part of 
Swiss territory, will probably never be raised again. Italy has re- 
ceived such ample satisfaction in the Tyrol (page 134) that her irre- 
dentist claims on her Alpine frontier should be now fully satisfied. 

The Swiss Federal Council has agreed to assume the diplomatic liechten- 
and consular representation of the principality of Liechtenstein, ^jj^^^^ 
If the negotiations succeed, Switzerland will take over the postal, ofSwitzer- 
telegraphic, telephonic, and customs service. Liechtenstein, a de- 
tached part of Germany, also is seeking recognition as an independ- 
ent state on account of her pecuhar geographical position (Fig. 99). 



land 



Former 
German 
commercial 
power 



Germany's 
new orienr 
tation 



CHAPTER TEN 

PROBLEMS OF THE GERMAN PEOPLE 

Before the war of 1914-1918, the problems of the German people 
covered pohtical and economic fields nearly as broad as those of Great 
Britain. German wares had been carried into every trading realm 
of the world, and the trader meant political as well as commercial 
penetration; colonies had been acquired in Africa and the Pacific, 
and concessions in Cliina. The products of German industry were 
of high grade, and they were cheap. In central Europe, the Bal- 
kdns, and Turkey, Germany's political influence was dominant and 
her trade was rapidly increasing. Supporting these advances in trade 
and colonies was an intelhgent and industrious people, trained in the 
arts, and possessing enviable sources of mineral wealth, especially 
iron and coal. 

As we shall see from a fist of her losses on a later page, Germany 
has been stripped of her overseas possessions, her merchant fleet has 
been surrendered, her good-will is gone, and the goods of other coun- 
tries — former rivals in trade — have displaced German goods almost 
everyAvhere. Her problems are now of a new order. Domestic 
issues, chiefly social and economic, have attained first rank. In 
place of colonies to be developed, there are debts to be paid. Instead 
of continued territorial gains, there are territorial losses. Once she 
could threaten her rivals, in a diplomatic struggle for land or trade 
resources, with a powerful navy and army ; now her navy is gone and 
she is required by treaty to reduce her army to 100,000 men. Once 
she looked out upon the world as a growing state ; she must now turn 
her attention inward, for domestic resources and political arrangements 
must first be developed, in the reconstitution of the national life. 



Distribu- 
tion of 
German- 
speaking 
people 



TERRITORIAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE GERMANS 

In rebuilding the German state, there is one factor of immediate 
concern — the distribution of German-speaking people on the map 
of Europe (Fig. 100). Formerly Germany and Austria contained the 
principal block, with an extension of 2,600,000 German-speaking 
people in eastern and central Switzerland, another much smaller group 
in Slesvig-Holstein, and scattered "islands" in Hungary, southern 
Russia, and the Baltic provinces, besides important "colonies" in 
southern Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and China. 

Upon this geographical distribution there depend political relations 

186 



Problems of the German People 



187 




Fig. 100. The dotted area represents German-spealdng people in former Austria-Hungary 
continuous with the main body in Germany. The black spots represent centers of German 
speech elsewhere in central and eastern Europe. They are due to many causes • — religious 
differences, crusades in the Baltic region, settlements of frontier guards against Turkey in 
Transylvania, artisan groups invited into southern Russia. After Debes, Hawlatlas. See also 
the map on page 72 of Kartographische und Schul-geographische Zeitschrift, Vol. 8, 1919, for 
recent German opinion on the subject. 

and influences of the first order. Some of the relations of the past 
throw light upon current problems. 



FORMER GERMAN INFLUENCE IN NEIGHBORING STATES 



about German 
and Aus 
trian co- 
operation 



In Austria-Hungary the Germans were so numerous 
11,000,000 — that what with their compact distribution and the 
German origin of the Hapsburgs, they exercised a dominating in- 
fluence on the political life of the empire, and at the same time served 
in part as a basis for the political views and ambitions of the Pan- 
Germans. The policies of Berlin were to a large degree reflected in 
the policies of Vienna. Moreover, the rulers of both empires had a 
cynical view of those people of non-German race and speech whom 
they had forcibly included within their imperial frontiers as minorities. 
For example, there was as little excuse for the Germans to withhold 
from the Danes of Slesvig a plebiscite promised by the treaty of 
Prague (1866) as for Austria to seize Bosnia and Herzegovina (1908). 

Among the other groups of Germans outside the German Empire, German 
the two most important were those in southern Russia and in the centers in 
Baltic Provinces. In southern Russia they comprised in large part Europe 



188 



The New World 




THE FIELD OF GERMAN COLONIZATION 



IN 



THE BALTIC PROVINCES AND THE UKRAINE 



Scale I = 14 500 000 



-Generalized racial boundaries _ ,. . , . . , f - main centers 

Cities connected wifm - nffira 

The boundaries of the Russian provinces the Hanseatic League \ roreign omce 

containing the compact mass of Little Russians underscored thus '"t^j.^'^'l ,/ 

constitute the limit here shown as the boundary ^^^^ ^ , ^^ /- '^"^^ \'-°'^'"9 privileges 

of the Ukraine. ^mCoal' "°'^' 

*■ Route of the Varangians § Iron 

THE GEOGR. REVIEW, DEC. 1918 _^^___^_^^_______^ 



Fig. 101. Historical and economic aspects of the German penetration of Russia. National 
boundaries as in 1914. " Racial," here as elsewhere in this book, is employed in the popular 
rather than the scientific sense. 



Problems of the German People 189 

the artisan classes, the merchants, and engineers with technical 
skill ; and in the Baltic Provinces they formed the land-owning class, 
the so-called German barons, or Baits, who formed a small percentage 
of the population but held about three fourths of the land. In both 
districts the German element was pohtically powerful, that of the 
Baltic Provinces being especially influential at the court of Petrograd. 
Libau and Memel are peopled chiefly by Germans, not Slavs. Riga 
had a powerful German commercial community with business connec- 
tions that penetrated far into Russia. 

Wherever the Germans have gone in eastern Europe they have Germaniza- 
carried the German tongue, German culture and political ideas, and eastern 
German industrial power. They are scattered over the whole Europe 
central and eastern European region as far as the middle Volga, and 
their influence has been felt everywhere. They have their own 
schools and trading associations ; many maintain their citizenship in 
Germany. German colonists west of Kiev, in northern Ukrainia, owned 
the steel mifls and many of the large landed estates ; many entered 
the army and became celebrated officers. The Saxons of Transyl- 
vania, in the midst of a Rumanian peasantry, were given a privileged 
position by Hungary. 

If the Germans had been able to enforce their will through the 
treaty of Brest-Litovsk (repudiated as one of the conditions of the 
armistice of 11 November 1918), they would have ruled once more 
over the eastern Baltic coastlands as in the days of the Teutonic 
Knights (13th and 14th centuries). A German prince had been 
selected as king of a greater Lithuania ; Esthonia and Latvia were 
to be mere political dependencies. Vast colonization plans were de- 
veloped which were to include many principles long successfully em- 
ployed by the Prussians aga".nst the Poles in the Pohsh Corridor and 
elsewhere. Had they succeeded, the number of German settlers 
would have rapidly increased ; German commerce and political con- 
trol would have been developed hand in hand ; the new Baltic repub- 
lics would have exchanged masters without gaining freedom. 

Indeed, the process would not have stopped with the Baltic Prov- 
inces. The Bolshevists were at first subsidized by Germany and 
were favored by the German higher military command. But for the 
defeat of Germany by the Allies and the re-creation of the Polish 
buffer state, we should have seen in time a strong welding of Russian 
commerce with that of Germany and the development of the closest 
political relations. 



190 



The New World 



GERMANY'S EASTERN MARCHES 
AGAINST SLAVDOM (ABOUT 1400) 




Fig. 102. The contest between German and Slav at the beginning of 
the 15th century. Based on Putzger, Historischer Schul-Allas, and 
Droysen, Hand-Atlas. 



In Germany today there is a strong tendency to pivot future po- 
litical and economic influences in eastern Europe, particularly in 
Russia, upon these German colonies. And if this policy is followed, 
Germany will in the future have an eastern, as opposed to a former 
western, orientation. A practical exhibition of this tendency was 
given in 1920 when thousands of Germans entered Lithuania to fight 
on her side against Polish control of Vilna. 



Problems of the German People 191 



GERMAN MINORITIES IN THE NEW STATES 

With the fall of German rulers in 1918, the democratic era, fore- Rise of 
shadowed by the Revolution of 1848 and by the steady increase of the Jem^cwc 
Social Democrats in the Reichstag, at last began. There came also the ^^^ 
final hberation of peoples who, by gaining independence, took away sub- of'Sect 
stantial portions of Germany, as well as the greater part of Austria and p^'op^®^ 
Hungary. Additional losses of population were incurred through the 
treaty of Versailles, which included many Germans in the new states, on 
the ground that the colonization methods of Germany and the forced 
ethnic penetrations of Austria and Hungary had put the former 
minority populations of these countries under a handicap. They 
had been driven out of districts in which they had a right to live on 
equal terms with the German-speaking newcomers. However, this 
political principle should not diminish appreciation of the service 
rendered by many German settlers on the eastern frontier of the 
German lands. While each one of the three great eastward-reaching 
prongs of German population, shown in Figure 100, is often described 
as the result of a war of conquest against Turks and Slavs, these wars 
were in the main a part of the general process of expansion of the 
higher civilization of western Europe eastward against the lower 
oriental civilization that long threatened to overwhelm it. 

The historic boundary of Bohemia has become, for a part of its 
course, the new boundary of Czecho-Slovakia, although more 
than 2,500,000 Germans are thereby included ; and the strip of land 
between Schneidemiihl and Bromberg (part of the Polish Corridor) 
becomes a part of the new Polish state, in spite of the present pre- 
dominance of Germans (Fig. 171). 

The exclusion of large numbers of Germans from Germany raises Germans 
a group of problems which every thoughtful person should examine °^^^^^^ °^ 
very closely. There is no more effective cry in the world than the cry in neighbor- 
of oppression, and Americans in particular have always had a sym- ^^ ^*^*®^ 
pathetic ear for a people in distress and struggling to be free, because 
as a self-governing, democratic, and free people they know what free- 
dom costs to get and to keep. Wliat if these excluded Germans in a 
few years raise the same cry as the peoples once held in their grasp ? 
In general the world was not sympathetic toward France in 1870- 
1871 ; but by 1914 it had become educated to the wrongs done by 
the German overlords in Alsace-Lorraine. The Poles and Czechs, 
who, if they cared to, could now turn the tables on the Germans run 
grave risks if they choose the way of the vengeful oppressor. 



192 



The New World 



Wm Aus- 
tria join 
Germany ? 



The Ger- 
mans of 
the new 
Poland 



The Ger- 
mans of 
Czecho- 
slovakia 
and Tyrol 



The largest group of Germans outside the German Empire is that 
in Austria. To join this country to Germany would give the latter a 
total population larger and much more homogeneous than that which 
she had before the war. It would also throw the frontiers of Germany 
eighty miles nearer the head of the Adriatic. While the Baltic and 
the North Sea coasts would be left practically unchanged, except for 
the short strip at Danzig and Memel, there would be consolidated a 
solid block of German territory that might lead to the revival of the 
former Pan-German plan by which central Europe would again pass 
under Teutonic domination. The treaty of Versailles has forbidden 
this union, which will not be permitted until it is reasonably certain 
that German democracy is real and has come to stay. 

The limits of the German Empire as drawn in 1914 show that the 
largest linguistic or " racial " minority within it was the Poles. These 
have now joined with the Poles of Austria (Galicia) and of Russia 
(Congress Poland ^ and a strip of territory adjoining it on the east) to 
form the new Polish state. In the Polish state about 2,000,000 Ger- 
mans will be included, but they form almost everywhere the minority 
of the population. Figure 170 shows that they were, in large numbers, 
officials of the Prussian state, officers in the German army, German 
teachers, colonists, foresters, and the like. They have the privilege 
of becoming Polish citizens before the end of 1921 or of moving into 
Germany if they wish to escape the handicap of German speech or birth. 

It would be a great calamity for Poland if the whole body of Ger- 
mans should choose to remain and to have representation in the 
Polish Diet, because they would form a minority party with an 
obstructionist pohcy, a party devoted to the harassing advertisement 
of wrongs real or alleged. The presence of such parties within the 
state was a standing difficulty with both Germany and Austria- 
Hungary. It embittered almost every debate and caused the neglect 
of purely national business to a deplorable extent. 

The same observation applies to those Germans, about 3,500,000 
in number, that have been assigned to Czecho-Slovakia. Many citi- 
zens of that country regret their inclusion as a minority group with- 
out interest in national affairs. The Germans of the Tyrol are in the 
same situation with respect to Italy. Only the most careful treatment 
by these three nations — Poland, Czecho-Slovakia, and Italy — of 



1 Name given to a political division of Russia (created a kingdom under the Czar by the 
Congress of Vienna) which includes chiefly Polish populations. Its boundaries on the west 
and south were the former German and Austrian international boundaries. Its limits are 
shown in Figure 169. 



Problems of the German People 193 

the minority Germans within their frontiers will relieve the anxiety 
of statesmen lest they turn on their former oppressors and create in 
the future a new crop of troubles for themselves and the world. 

The protection of minority rights is indeed one of the great prob- The rights 
lems of the time. It cannot be solved by splitting up the world in- °! minori- 
definitely. Not every tiny group can have its own flag and place difficult to 
in the family of nations. For the weakest peoples there is only one ^""*°*®® 
practicable alleviation — that minorities shall have a court of appeal 
and certain broad guarantees of personal rights of speech and religion. 



CONSEQUENCES OF THE WAR 

Instead of advancing her program of expansion toward Russia and what Ger- 

in Africa, the Pacific, and the Near East, Germany has lost territory, ™^°?^ ^** 

trade, and privileges. The following are to her the most important Europe by 

European consequences of the World War : of Vers^ames 

(1) German coal in the Saar valley has been given to France to 
offset the losses caused by the destruction of the French 
coal mines, chiefly at Lens and Valenciennes, during the war. 
A plebiscite at the end of fifteen years will determine final 
ownership of the Saar district ; but the region may vote for 
France in spite of the restriction of the privilege of voting to 
persons living in the Saar on 10 January 1920. Before the 
war (1913), the Saar coal mines yielded 17,400,000 tons of coal, 
or about 9 per cent of Germany's total. 

(2) Eupen, Malmedy, and Moresnet, ceded to Belgium, have 
mineral resources of value, but their total little affects the 
totals for all Germany before the war. 

(3) The loss of a part of the Silesian coal fields of southeastern 
Germany is inevitable, and with that part will go some of 
the strength of the city of Breslau and the other towns 
near by. The area of the plebiscite zone is about 4000 square 
miles, and the population is 2,000,000. The coal production 
of the district was 43,000,000 tons in 1913, or more than one 
fifth of the total production of the German Empire (which 
exceeded 190,000,000 tons in 1913). It also produced 51 per 
cent of the lead ore of Germany and 72 per cent of the zinc. 
Though 65 per cent of the population of aU German Silesia 
is Polish, the great economic loss to Germany which the ces- 
sion to Poland would cause resulted in the decision to hold 
a plebiscite. The vote was taken in March 1921, and was on 
the whole favorable to Germany; but the final boundary, 
which will be determined by the Supreme Council, may not 
accurately reflect the results of the vote. 



194 The New World 

(4) The transfer of former German territory in the northeastern 
part of East Prussia beyond the Niemen River is justified 
by the presence of the Lithuanian population that has 
hved there for centuries (Fig. 184). With the recognition 
of a Lithuanian government will go, of course, the effort 
to join into one group the whole Lithuanian population, as 
far as this is possible. With the trans-Niemen country wiU 
probably go the former German port of Memel, the outlet of 
the Niemen basin and the terminus of a Russian railway. 
Pending a settlement of the Russian question, with which 
Lithuanian independence is intimately related, Memel is held 
by warships of the Allied powers. 

(5) Exclusive of Danzig and Silesia, Germany has lost 2,800,000 
people and 16,000 square miles to Poland; this territory 
includes the rich industrial province of Posen, besides valuable 
forest and agricultural lands, coal and other mines, and about 
one tenth the total German production of grain and one sixth 
the German production of potatoes. 

(6) The separation of East Prussia from the main body of Ger- 
man territory doubtless will disturb the economic life of the 
region. Rut it is important to furnish a nation of 25,000,000 
people (Poland) with a port (Danzig) and the means of a 
secure access to the sea (the Polish Corridor, or strip of 
land west of the Vistula that joins Poland with the Raltic). 
The middle of the Polish Corridor is only thirty miles wide, 
too narrow to be the base of great military operations ; and 
the city of Danzig itself is to be governed by the League 
of Nations through a High Commissioner. The provisions 
for the management of the port of Danzig and for a treaty 
between Danzig and Poland respecting the use of the port 
guarantee freedom of transit to the Poles at Danzig and also 
to the Germans of East Prussia over the railroad from Konigs- 
berg to Schneidemiihl and Rerlin. Resides this there is free 
navigation of the Raltic for goods that may go by sea, and 
the common use by both East Prussia and Poland of the navi- 
gable (and internationalized) Vistula that separates their 
territory. 

(7) The plebiscite held in southern East Prussia (AUenstein), re- 
sulted in favor of union with Germany. The people are 
Poles in race and speech, but they are Lutheran in religion, 
unlike the main body of Poles, who are Catholics. The total 
population is about 716,000. The neighboring plebiscite area 
of Marienwerder (Fig. 171) is almost wholly German and also 
voted to remain in Germany. 

(8) The area which Germany has lost in Slesvig contains 
about 1500 square miles; the population is 300,000. This 



Problems of the German People 



195 




Fig. 103. Generalized view of the conditions of German territorial losses by districts. The 
figure under Malmedy represents the total for the districts of Eupen and Malmedy. The Allen- 
stein and Marienwerder districts east of the Vistula have voted to remain German ; only the 
northern of the two Slesvig. districts voted to join Denmark. For details of final Slesvig 
boundary see Figure 91. Originally set apart as plebiscite areas, the Teschen, Orawa, and Spits 
districts have been settled by the Conference of Ambassadors (Fig. 179), though the Polish 
Diet has yet to ratify the agreement. Czecho-Slovakia eventually gains a small district north- 
west of Teschen. If Austria should join Germany (page 214), German losses of population and 
torritorv would be more than counterbalanced. 



196 The New World 

is an agricultural region and its loss does not seriously affect 
Germany. 

(9) The loss of Alsace-Lorraine includes not only territory, but 
the city of Strasbourg and control of the Rhine River traffic. 
The region also produced 21,000,000 tons of iron yearly 
and 350,000 tons, or 3 per cent, of the world's potash supply. 
A large part of Germany's reserves of potash were in Alsace, 
besides important reserves of petroleum. 

(10) All told, the loss in Germany's principal agricultural prod- 
ucts, such as barley, oats, wheat, rye, potatoes, sugar beets, 
etc., is from 12 to 15 per cent. Her loss in manufacturing 
will be about 10 per cent, and her loss in population about 12 
per cent. 

(11) There were also lost 2,550,000 tons of shipping, not including 
1,000,000 additional tons to be built in the next five years 
to offset in part the loss of Allied shipping by submarine 
sinkings. A fourth of the country's canal boats and thou- 
sands of locomotives and cars were surrendered. The terri- 
tories lost include 35,000 miles of railroad. 

German losses in E\iropean territory are summarized as foUows : 

Area of Parts of Germany Affected by the Treaty of Versailles 



Neutral Moresnet . . . . 

Kreis Eupen 

Kj-eis Malmedy 

Alsace-Lorraine 

Saar Rasin (possibly not permanent) .... 
To Poland (not including Silesian plebiscite zone) 

Free City of Danzig 

Memel, or trans-Niemen, district 

Slesvig plebiscite area (northern zone) .... 



Total 



Sq. Miles 

2 

68 

314 

5,600 

730 

16,000 

729 

910 

1,550 



25,903 



Taking all the losses together, the former Germany in Europe of 
203,834 square miles has been reduced by over 25,000 square miles, 
or 13 per cent. Of her European population, Germany has ceded 
8,000,000, or about 12 per cent of her pre-war total . Owing to the 
losses of the war by disease and in battle, there has been a further 
reduction of the population by more than 5,000,000, including 2,000,000 
young men. 

Among the losses incurred in China by Germany are these : 



Problems of the German People 



197 




,.. Industry and mining support more 
^ Than 40% of the local population 

Husbandry supports more than 
50% of the local population 

SCALE or MILES 



Fig. 104. Distribution of industrial and agricultural population of Germany in 1895. The 
map represents Germany in a period of transition. In the decade from 1880 to 1890, German pig- 
iron production increased 100 per cent. The same rate of increase was maintained during the 
two succeeding decades. Note the belt of industrial population along the French and Belgian 
frontiers. Compare this map with the map of population density (Fig. 60). The territorial 
losses on the east involve chiefly agriciiltural population. From maps in Statistische Jahrbuch 
des Deutsches Reich, 1898. 

(1) The privilege of maintaining a postal service. (All the powers 
enjoyed this privilege, which was gained before China had 
a postal service.) 

(2) Concessions at Tientsin, Hankow, and Kiaochow (Fig. 244). 

(3) The privilege of maintaining legation guards at Pekin. 

(4) The Shantung railway, mines, and port rights now turned over 
to the Japanese government. 

In addition to her losses in Europe and Asia, Germany loses all 
her overseas colonies, amounting to an area of about 1,000,000 square 
miles and a population estimated at 12,000,000. The colonies sup- 
plied a fourth of the total German demand for rubber, besides valu- 
able oils and fibers.^ 

^ For the value of these possessions see the chapters on Africa, Australia and the Pacific, 
and the Far East. 



198 



The New World 



DifSculties 
in the way 
of colonial 
expansion 



The colonial losses not specified on page 197 are as follows : 

Africa 

(1) Togoland 

(2) Cameroons 

(3) German Southwest Africa 

(4) German East Africa 



Pacific 

(1) Marshall, Marianne, and Caro- 
line Islands 

Kaiser Wilhelm's Land and Bis- 
marck Archipelago 

(3) German Samoa and Solomons 

(4) Nauru Island 



(2) 



FORMER COLONIAL INTERESTS OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE 

Germany entered the field of colonial activity late in her national 
career. She made her fkst essay in colonial expansion in the Pacific 
as late as 1884 ; and it was only after much vacillation that she 
finally established herself in Africa in the same year. Her leaders had 
been opposed to colonial expansion ; their sense of economy was shocked 
by the large expenditures that were necessary to keep distant and 
undeveloped territories under control. As a consequence. Great 
Britain and France had a full half century and more of advantage 
in time and experience. Between 1876 and 1884 these powers had 
laid claim to some of the choicest areas in Africa. The field of colo- 
nial expansion had been greatly narrowed. 

When Germany awoke to a full realization of the value of colonial 
raw materials to her magically expanding industries, she found that 
she could gain important advantages only by pursuing an exceedingly 
active policy. What she had lacked in initiative she now made up by 
aggression and skill. Wherever her colonies touched the territory of 
other powers, she made the fullest possible use of any differences of 
opinion regarding the location of boundary lines or the extent of her 
concessions or the terms of her treaties with native chiefs. Her mer- 
chants had established trading stations on both the east and the west 
coasts of Africa. In 1859 Hamburg, Bremen, and Liibeck made a 
commercial treaty with the Sultan of Zanzibar. By 1884 about sixty 
German trading posts and a hundred or more of missionary stations 
were located on the west coast. To consolidate her interests, impose 
her own tariffs, and have strategic commercial and military bases 
for further gains now became accepted aims of Germany's African 
policy. The field of her activity was limited to central Africa, where 
vague boundaries enabled her to gain control without resort to war. 

German Southwest Africa was the scene of the first struggle. Fear- 
ing the results of the activities of German traders and missionaries in 
the Walvis Bay region, and yet momentarily timid in extending its 



Problems of the German People 



199 



own frontiers, the Brit- 
ish government in 1878 
declared the bay and 
fifteen miles round it 
British territory. The 
Germans responded by 
taking possession of 
Angra Pequena, pro- 
claiming it as German 
territory, and with it 
that part of the west 
coast between Portu- 
guese Angola and the 
Orange River, save the 
small tract at Walvis 
Bay. In the same year 
(1884) Togoland was 
declared a German pro- 
tectorate, on the ground 
that eight German trad- 
ing stations had been 

11. -ii 1 +V.4- ■^^^' ^^^' General map showing the location of the former 

eStaDllSneCl anCl tnat German colonies in Africa. For their disposition see Figures 

definite claims to the is and 49. 

region had not been made by either France or Great Britain. Also in 
the same year, German political agents concluded treaties with some 
of the native chiefs of the Cameroons and the German flag was 
hoisted over the third of the newly won African colonies. 

In the following year Great Britain acknowledged German com- 
mercial claims over East Africa. By 1888 some thirty coffee and 
tobacco plantations were in operation. Arab slave traders fomented 
a rebellion which was speedily put down, and in 1889 the German 
East Africa Society bought out the claims of the Sultan of Zanzibar 
to the coast strip, then under German control. Subsequent agreements 
with Great Britain in 1886 and 1890 fixed the boundaries of German 
East Africa and closed the first chapter of German colonization there. 

Germany's ambitions looked not only toward the development of German 
the African colonies, but also to the acquisition of other colonies near fmbitjons 

... . 1 '" Africa 

those already established. Her political moves in East Africa led the 
statesmen of rival nations to believe that she wished to acquire Portu- 
guese East Africa as well as portions of French and Belgian territory. 
That the trade of the African colonies of Portugal was carried largely 




200 



Tlie New World 



Africa the 

chief 

theatre of 

German 

colonial 

enterprise 



by German ships and that the Portuguese colonial administration was 
weak, were facts of significance. 

While Germany's African colonies might ultimately prove to be of 
large importance, they were a drain upon her national resources (ex- 
cept in the case of Togoland). Neither was her control to the advan- 
tage of the regions she occupied. One of the reasons which impelled 
the Peace Conference of Paris to take the colonies from her was her 
treatment of the natives. The most striking case of the violation of 
native rights was in the Herero war in German Southwest Africa. 

Two of the four African colonies of Germany — German Southwest 
Africa and German East Africa — fall under British administration, 
the former as a part of the Union of South Africa, the latter, except for 
a small portion ceded to Belgium (page 126), as a separate colonial 
possession. Neither is held, however, in full sovereignty, but as a 
mandated region under the authority of the League of Nations, to 
be administered for the benefit of the natives. Togoland and the 
Cameroons are divided between France and Great Britain (Figs. 
267 and 268) for control in the same way. This is a new departure 
in colonial government. It makes the details of administration in 
these areas matters of public knowledge and approval. It also 
makes it possible in the future to return the colonies to Germany, 
though such a step is most unlikely in view of the flow of capital 
from the mandatory powers into the colonies and the strong objec- 
tion of business to the unsettling effect of changes in political status. 



Beginnings 
of German 
expansion 
in the 
Pacific 



FORMER GERMAN INTERESTS IN THE PACIFIC 

Four stages may be recognized in the development of German 
ambitions in the Pacific. The first was purely commercial; the 
second was annexation — to extend the German Empire ; in the next 
stage the islands of the Pacific were regarded not merely as additions 
to empire or as commercial assets, but as naval bases from which 
the power of the German government could be extended to rich and 
populous countries ; the fourth, or present, stage is one of complete 
loss of former territories. 

International Rivalries in Samoa 

Germany's first colonial activity in the Pacific was due to the effort 
of a Hamburg merchant prince — Godeffroy — who sent agents to 
Fiji and Samoa to establish cotton plantations. This was just after 
the American Civil War, when the European cotton famine turned 
the minds of merchants and statesmen to the necessity of producing 



con- 



Prohlems of the German People 201 

at least a part of their raw cotton within their own empires. Later 
the schemes of Godeffroy's company won a subvention from the Ger- 
man Reichstag. 

But the field was not entirely open in Samoa, for the United States xhe 
had had since 1839 the exclusive right to establish a naval base in the dominium 
harbor of Pago Pago at Samoa, and the British colonies of Australia 
and New Zealand had developed an important trade in Samoa. In 
order to adjust the conflicting claims, the three powers — the United 
States, Great Britain, and Germany — sent representatives to a con- 
ference in Berlin which resulted in the Berlin General Act of 1880, 
providing a government for the kingdom of Samoa, the condominium, 
which existed down to 1899. In that year the three powers signatory 
to the Berhn General Act jointly agreed to annul the act and distrib- 
ute Samoa. Tutuila was allotted to the United States, Upolu to 
Germany, and Savai'i to Great Britain. No sooner was this done 
than Great Britain gave Savai'i to Germany in return for conces- 
sions made by Germany to Great Britain in the Tonga and Solomon 
Islands. 

In German Samoa the native population is about 35,000, and the 
annual trade has a value of $2,500,000. These islands are now turned 
over to New Zealand to administer as a mandatory power of the League 
of Nations. 

New Guinea 



German 



In 1884 Germany annexed the northern shore of New Guinea, from 
the Dutch boundary eastward to Dampier Strait, and inland as far as occupation 
the supposed crest of the central range of mountains. Almost imme- oiSTea on 
diately thereafter she annexed the whole of the New Britain Archi- thethresh- 
pelago (renamed Bismarck) and the northern Solomon Islands. Before Austi-aiia 
these acts were committed, in 1883, Queensland had annexed the eastern 
half of the continental island of New Guinea, but the British govern- 
ment disavowed the act on the ground that it gave sovereign rights to 
a colony. It was in the face of this disavowal that the German an- 
nexation of the northeastern part of New Guinea (Kaiser Wilhelm's 
Land) took place. But the British government, yielding to popular 
sentiment, then annexed the southern shore of New Guinea and 
turned it over to Australia for administration, at the same time 
establishing a protectorate over the southern Solomons and Santa 
Cruz (Fig. 253). 

The area of these territories, now assigned to Australia, is nearly 
90,000 square miles, and the population numbers about 700,000. 



202 



The Neio World 



Difficulties 
of colonial 
trade re- 
vival 



Only two years after the acquisition of northeastern New Guinea, 
Germany hoisted her flag over the Marshall Islands, in protection 
of the commercial rights of a German company, and in 1899, the year 
after America had acquired the Philippines and the island of Guam 
from Spain, Germany bought from Spain the rest of her holdings in 
the Pacific — the Carohnes, the Mariannes, and the Pelew Islands. 
These territories have an area of less than 1000 square miles and a 
native population of 70, 000. All of them go to Japan except Nauru, 
which is south of the equator and goes to Great Britain (page 523). 

With all the colonial possessions lost, German merchants are limited 
in their efforts at reviving overseas trade to general trading conditions 
hke those that affect, say, the foreign merchants of Sweden or Switzer- 
land. Since the commercial advantages and resources of every man- 
dated region are open to the traders of all nations on terms of equality, 
German trade in her former colonies will revive, at least to some extent. 
And that it would revive quickly is certain, were it not for the lack 
of shipping. As a result of her unrestricted submarine campaign 
Germany was required, by treaty, in part to restore AUied shipping 
by surrendering her commercial fleet and allocating a large part of the 
tonnage to be built in the next few years. 

In the colonies of other powers Germany's trade can be recovered 
only so far as tariff arrangements and good- will permit. France, Great 
Britain, and the United States have preferential rates ; Italy, though 
her colonies have small interest to Germany, has restrictive shipping 
laws in force in Libya; Portugal puts all foreign traders under a' 
handicap in her African colonies. Tropical raw materials will be less 
easy for Germany to obtain, and her trade with the nations of the 
temperate zone will be distinctly revived only when a stable govern- 
ment is formed, shipping built, currency deflated, and credit provided 
for new mercantile enterprises. 



The Sparta- 
cists or 
Bolshevists 
of Ger- 
many 



THE BURDENS OF THE NEW GERMAN STATE 

The chief problem of Germany today is one of reconstruction to 
fit to her desperate needs the resources left in her hands and to stab- 
ihze the social and economic conditions created by the revolution 
(November 1918). The social and political conditions of Germany 
were becoming more and more critical even before the World War. 
Through the revolution that accompanied the armistice, they have 
become the vital problems of the day. The disorderly elements among 
the laboring classes in the industrial centers have taken advantage 
of the general turmoil to demand sovereign rights for themselves, which 



Problems of the German People 203 

means merely that the tyranny of the militarists and imperiahsts 
has been exchanged for the tyranny of a small organized industrial 
class — the so-called proletariat. 

It also remains to be seen whether Germany will become a great possible 
confederation or a collection of quarreling and self-seeking states, revival of 
such as existed before the German Empire was formed in 1871. For manCon- 
the strength of the former empire is not a measure of the poHtical *®^®^**^°° 
resourcefulness of the people in the present democratic regime. The 
German people had never been able by peaceful processes to join 
together into a German union the various small Germanic states that 
had arisen during the two hundred years before Napoleon's time. 

The growth of Prussia and the absorption of the smaller states of Basis of 
the German union was almost uniformly effected by military means, f^"ner 
and when in 1870 France was conquered in a brief and spectacular unity 
campaign, military autocracy was confidently crowned with glory by 
the German people. Thereafter the government was supreme and 
molded public opinion to its will, instead of drawing its inspiration 
from public opinion. The growth of the empire had indeed been 
marvelous, but the principle of growth had been one of dependence 
upon military autocracy ; and the spread of German culture implied 
the control, by that autocracy, of peoples who cherished liberty far 
more dearly than any benefits which German culture might bring. 

No one should minimize the feat of the German people in holding The broken 
together in one fashion or another through the days of the Spartacist ^ ^"^* °^ 
uprisings and the final realization of Allied victory. The terrible 
defeat of the German armies practically destroyed the dreams and 
ambitions of all but a desperate and limited group. Though the 
people tried to delude themselves into thinking that they had not met 
a military defeat, they all knew that such a defeat was a reality. All 
thought of a greater Germany was destroyed. Every one had been 
fighting in the hope of victory, and when defeat came, people had no 
alternative purposes or new sources of enthusiasm. They had neither 
hope nor a common plan of action. As with the Russian people. Life 
had lost its old meaning. It will take time to develop constructive 
schemes. 

Tending still further to disorganize German life was the length The long 
of the period of the armistice and of the blockade. The Germans preiimi- 

^ , naries of 

had no raw materials, work would not buy clothes and food, and the new 
even the habit of work itself had been destroyed by the war, at "* 

1 The name given to radical groups, organized almost wholly in the towns, who estab- 
lished local governments on the communistic principle (1918-1919). 



204 



The New World 



Means of 
commerce 
destroyed 



The new 
constitu- 
tion of 
Germany 



Amount 
of the 
German 
indemnity 



least among tne returned soldiers. The effect was heightened by the 
stories of what the treaty of peace would do to Germany. The 
whole Silesian district, it was reported, would be given to Poland ; 
and for a time the belief was cmrent that the whole Left Bank of the 
Rhine would be given to France. For a short time a "Republic of 
the Left Bank of the Rhine" was in nominal existence. 

In addition, German merchants had been driven out of all the 
Allied countries and from Africa, the Far East, Turkey, and South 
America. There was no basis for foreign trade. The colonies were 
lost and the shipping had been surrendered. Transport facilities had 
to be rebuilt. Raw material was doled out to the Germans. There 
was not sufficient work even for those who wanted to work. 

With the actual signing of the treaty of Versailles accomplished, 
Germany had her first hopes established, and immediately the radical 
movement received a severe check. Up to that time no German leader 
had a material basis for his program ; he could build only on prophecy 
and hope. It was therefore natural that the radical and disorderly 
elements of the towns should have split the empire into a score of 
fragments. While there was a central government with headquarters 
at Weimar, later in Berlin, yet its authority was long recognized in 
only a small part of Germany. 

The new constitution of Germany, framed by a constitutional 
assembly sitting at Weimar in 1919 and adopted by the Reichstag 
early in 1920, has many excellent features, but it remains to be seen 
if the people really intend to obey its conditions. There is liberty of 
speech and of the press as well as of association. There is complete 
religious freedom. The whole structure of the government is demo- 
cratic — at least theoretically. The seed planted by the German 
thinkers and dreamers of 1848 is now bearing fruit. Though these 
men were exiled and imprisoned, they laid the foundations of the 
new Germany. The whole world was so shocked by the conduct of 
the war in the occupied territories and by the disclosure of sinister 
imperial designs in the treaties of Brest-Litovsk and Bucarest (which 
had put Russia and Rumania respectively in a state of economic 
slavery), that only actual and prolonged experience with the spirit of 
the new Germany will convince it that the change is sincere and last- 
ing. 

Working against Germany in her economic struggle are the iU-will 
of much of the world and the headway other European nations have 
made during the war in seizing foreign markets. She will find it hard 
to get raw materials : her competitors control nearly all the sources. 



Problems of the German People 205 

Also, German goods will not be so readily purchased by persons who 
remember her evil com-se in 1914. Her people can overcome these 
handicaps only by work. According to the treaty of Versailles, for five 
years beginning in 1921, Germany must pay $250,000,000 a year, 
and thereafter $600,000,000 a year. This is arranged as interest on 
gold bonds amounting to $10,000,000,000, which Germany is to 
deliver to the Allies. A second issue of $10,000,000,000 at 5 per cent 
interest is to be made when Germany is thought by the Permanent 
Reparations Commission to be capable of paying the interest. 

To avoid the business checks that grow out of the indefiniteness of 
the reparation total it was planned to fix that total while at the same 
time securing Germany's assent to it. The amount proposed was 
$55,000,000,000, to be paid in about forty years, and an export tax 
in addition ; but Germany's representatives attempted to reduce this 
sum on the ground that it is economically impossible to pay it. 
When Germany finally rejected Allied proposals, French, British, 
and Belgian armies advanced still farther into western Germany, 
occupying places of strategic and industrial importance. They are 
to be withdrawn when Germany gives evidence of good faith in 
carrying out the terms of the treaty of Versailles and in meeting the 
first of her reparation payments. 

The Allies had it in their power to impose much more severe con- Limita- 
ditions. In the matter of trade (which involves both access to raw ^^°^^ °° 
materials and a market for her manufactures) Germany has come trade 
off well. Practically the only limitation is the reasonable one that 
her tariffs and other trade arrangements shall be uniform and shall 
be as favorable, at least, to her late enemies as those accorded to the 
trade of any other state. Even this arrangement is to be in force 
for five years only. Out of it may grow much simpler tariffs for 
all Europe. 



CHAPTER ELEVEN 

THE NATIONAL EXISTENCE OF AUSTRIA 

When the Austro-Hungarian Empire fell apart in 1918, there was 
formed, out of the chief German-speaking element, the Republic of 
Austria, with Vienna as its capital and with a provisional democratic 
government. The frontiers remained to be defined by treaty with the 
Allied and Associated Powers. Ex-Emperor Charles with his closest 
adherents took refuge, early in 1919, in Switzerland. The northern and 
southern Slavs set up new states ; the Magyars, always loosely joined 
to Austria, adopted a separate national program; the Rumanians of 
Transylvania (Fig. 143) became a part of Greater Rumania ; Galicia 
was included within the frontiers of Poland. These changes brought 
about a reduction of population from 51,000,000 for the whole Austro- 
Hungarian Empire (or from 28,500,000 if we exclude Hungary) before 
1914 to 6,000,000 at the present time. 




Fig. 106. Division and allotment of territory of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The plebi- 
scite areas are indicated by K for Klagenfurt (now Austrian), T for Teschen, O for Orawa, and 
S for Spits. For a pending solution of the three last-named plebiscite areas, as recommended by 
the Conference of the Ambassadors, see Figure 179 ; for boundary between Italy and Jugo-Slavia 
see Figure 138. 

206 



The National Existence of Austria 



207 




Fig. 107. The new Austrian boundary and the principal cities of Austria. Note the Klagen- 
furt plebiscite area, the southern border of which now becomes a part of the Austrian-Jugo-Slav 
boundary. Note also the addition to Austria of western, or German, Hungary. L is for 
Liechtenstein. 

By the terms of the treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye, the area of Extent of 
Austria is reduced from 116,000 square miles to 32,000 square miles. Hungarian 
Before the World War she had an outlet on the Adriatic at Trieste and Empire 
Pola, and she also owned Dalmatia. With Hungary she controlled 
Bosnia and Herzegovina and thus held that long stretch of the eastern 
Adriatic coast that extends from the southern border of Montenegro 
northwestward for nearly 400 miles. With Hungary she controlled 
more than 700 miles of the course of the Danube. Her frontier ran 
for more than 1000 miles coterminous with that of Germany. She held 
the strategic passes in the mountains lying near the Italian frontier. 
East and west she had a maximum breadth of 750 miles in a straight 
hne. North and south she extended 625 miles, thus spanning a sec- 
tion of country that extended from the plains of northern Europe to 
the Mediterranean lands on the shores of the southern Adriatic, and 
from the heart of the Alps on the borders of Switzerland in Vorarlberg 
to the plain of the Vistula on the farther side of the Carpathian 
Mountains. 

The northern and southern Slavs (Czecho-Slovaks and Jugo-Slavs Racial 
respectively) were chiefly in her domain. The Hungarians were allied compieri- 
with her in the empire. Her territory contained a large block of Ruma- empire 
nians, a smaller block of Italians, many Poles in Western Galicia, and 
4,000,000 Ruthenians in Eastern Galicia and on the southern side of 
the Carpathians ; it even included a large number of Mohammedans 
of Slavic race in the provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. 



208 



The New World 



The empire was geographically compact ; ethnically It was highly 
heterogeneous. It was long customary to call Austria-Hungary the 
polyglot empire, but it should be remembered that within the Rus- 
sian realm and the present British Empire there are many more 
ethnic complexities than Austria-Hungetry had. The ethnic com- 
plexities of Austria-Hungary appeared the more prominent because 
the various elements were far more self-conscious politically and had 
had at one time or another a national life that formed a strong basis 
for continued agitation for independence. 



Extraor- 
dinary 
layout of 
the national 
domain of 
Austria 



Fragmen- 
tation of 
Austria 



THE PRESENT TERRITORY OF AUSTRIA 

Viewing the Austro-Hungarian Empire with Hungary excluded, 
we find Austria itself to have been a fringe of country semicircular 
in form, reaching from near Cattaro on the eastern Adriatic north- 
ward to Fiume, Trieste, Vienna, and Prague ; eastward to Cracow 
and Lemburg ; and southward to Czernowitz and Kimpolung in Buko- 
vina (Fig. 108). The length of this fringe exceeds 2000 miles and its 
average width is about 100 miles, reaching over 200 miles in Bohemia 
and Moravia, 250 miles in the Tyrol-Salzburg-Styria region, and nar- 
rowing to a strip of islands in the northeastern Adriatic and to a belt 
of mainland only 10 miles wide in southern Dalmatia. 

Within this area there is great diversity of relief, of ethnography, 
of density of population, of products, and of means of access to the sea. 
Neither the courses of the rivers nor the trends of the mountains 
justified so extraordinary a layout of the national domain. The vari- 
ous fragments of larger physical and commercial regions that formed 
Austria were held together by no natural bonds. The southern Tyrol 
is now politically united to Italy, by the treaty of St. Germain. Por- 
tions of Istria also were Italian, and they too are added to Italy by 
the treaty of Rapallo, which fixed the boundary between Italy and 
Jugo-Slavia. Except for Zara, the Dalmatian mainland goes to Jugo- 
slavia. Bohemia and Moravia, populated chiefly by branches of 
the northern Slavs, become a part of the Czecho-Slovak repubhc. 
Poland has obtained all of Galicia. There is added to Rumania the 
former Crownland of Bukovina, except for a small sahent on the 
northern frontier, which Poland has gained. 

The fragments that have thus gone to a new or a rival power are 
in general in more natural relationship today than under the former 
system. The Bohemian plateau and its adjacent valleys have marked 
geographical unity. Gahcia has a natural southern border — the 



The National Existence of Austria 



209 



Carpathians — and a southeastward- trending valley lowland that con- 
tains a belt of dense population, a lowland which is continuous with 
the plains of the Vistula drainage basin. 




Fig. 108. The shape and population density of Austria according to the official census of 1910. 
For the break-up of Austria-Hungary and the relation of its parts to the denser nuclei of popu- 
lation shown above, see Figure 106. Note the denser population centers of Bohemia, the band 
of population in GaUcia, the great contrast between the Viennese district and the western part 
of Austria proper, and the losses on the south to Italy and Jugo-Slavia. After Wallis, in the 
Geographical Review, July 1918. 

Only a small portion of the Austrian frontier was left to a decision Kiagenfurt 
by plebiscite — the Kiagenfurt area (Fig. 109). In trying to separate an^^t"*^ 
Jugo-Slavs (Slovenes at this point) from Austrians, there was one results 
feature of the physical geography that gave much trouble. The 
Kiagenfurt basin is enclosed by high land. It would seem wise to 
treat as a unit a region so well-marked by nature and by commercial 
relations. But the southern side of the basin is peopled by Slovenes, 
the northern side by Austrians. The city of Kiagenfurt, with a popula- 
tion of 29,000, has a German majority, though this condition is of recent 
development. The matter was settled by a plebiscite in October 1920. 
It was arranged to take the vote in two zones, a northern and a 
southern. The people of the southern zone voted first and decided 
to join Austria. This made it unnecessary to take a vote in the north- 
ern district, which automatically remains Austrian territory. 



210 



The New World 



Ethnic 
differences 



Present 
distribu- 
tion of 
population 



Emigration 
from Aus- 
tria 



RACIAL ELEMENTS 

In sympathy with the main outlines of the physical system was 
the distribution of the hnguistic groups within Austria — there is no 
"Austrian" race. Tlius the tendency toward the break-up of Austria 
which is indicated by the unnatural physical relationship was reen- 
forced by the strong ethnic differences. The following table, based 
on the Austrian census of 1910, shows how the 28,500,000 total pop- 
ulation of Austria was distributed among the 17 provinces : 

Population, Nationality, and Religions of Austria ^ 









POPULATION 
IN 

Thousands 


Percentages 


Province 


Religion 


Nationality 


Lower Aus 

Upper Aus 

Salzburg 

Styria . 

Carinthia 

Carniola 

Trieste 

Goritzia 

Istria . 

Tyrol . 

Vorarlberg 

Bohemia 

Moravia 

Silesia . 

Galicia 

Bukovina 

Dalmatia 


tri 
tri 


a . 
a . 


3,532 

853 
215 

1,444 
396 
526 
230 
261 
404 
947 
145 

6,770 

2,622 
757 

8,026 
800 
646 


96 % Roman Catholic 
97 
98 
98 
94 
100 
95 
99 
99 
99 
98 
96 
95 
84 
47 

68 Greek Orthodox 
83 Roman Catholic 


96 % German 

100 " 

100 " 

71 " 29% Slovene 
79 " 21 

94 Slovene 

62 Italian 30 Slovene 

62 Slovene 36 Italian 
44 Serbo-Croat 38 

57 German 42 " 

95 " 

63 Czech 37 German 

72 . " 28 

44 German 32 Pole 

59 Pole 40 Ruthenian 

38 Ruthenian 34 Rumanian 

96 Serbo-Croat 


Total 






28,574 





The new state has a population exceeding 6,000,000, distributed 
approximately as follows : 

Lower Austria 3,500,000 Tyrol and Vorarlberg 450,000 

Upper Austria 850,000 Styria 750,000 

Salzburg 200,000 Carinthia 300,000 

In the case of Tyrol, Styria, and Carinthia, only the German districts 
that are left to Austria are counted. 

Owing partly to the conditions of life under an autocratic gov- 
ernment and partly to the general economic tendencies of the time, 
including growing industrialization, emigration from Austria rose to 

^ Up to this point we have been dealing chiefly with western European peoples. We now 
have to deal with new national and linguistic elements. Here we face the problem of the 
Magyar and the Slav. The reader should turn to Figures 111, 120, and 121 and to related 
pages for a general view of the population elements listed in this table. 



The National Existence of Austria 



211 




Fig. 109. The Klagenfurt plebiscite area. District I voted in October 1920 to remain with 
Austria on the north rather than be transferred to Jugo-Slavia on the south. As a result of this 
action, district II avoided a vote and automatically remained with Austria. 



higher and higher figures in the years before the World War. From 
1910 to 1913, the total net emigration from Austria to the United 
States averaged more than 80,000 a year, of which 36 per cent were 
Poles, 24 per cent Ruthenians, 10 per cent Czechs, and 7 per cent 
Germans. For many years 75 per cent of the overseas emigration 
from Austria has been to the United States, with 12 per cent to 
Canada and 4 per cent to South America, chiefly Argentina and Brazil. 

Within Austria itself there was a tendency toward migration of 
the people from the country to Vienna and other large towns. In 
the period from 1880 to 1910, twelve towns had an increase of be- 
tween 60 and 120 per cent, including such places as Vienna, Czer- 
nowitz, and Innsbruck among German towns, Lemberg and Cracow 
£imong Polish towns, Pilsen and Budweis among Czech towns, and 
Trieste among Italian towns, to mention the best-known places on the 
Hst. 

Among these Vienna had the most unnatural growth, partly be- 
cause, as the capital of an empire of 51,000,000 people, it attracted 
thousands of officials, soldiers, and tradesmen and had a number 
of imperial institutions, and partly because of the forced growth of 
industries and its reputation as a center of culture. It now contains 
2,000,000 people out of a total Austrian population of 6,000,000, a 
disproportion in population between capital and country greater than 
that of any other state in central Europe. Merely to exist requires 
of Vienna an economic and industrial reorganization of the most ex- 
treme kind. Already the suffering has been terrible ; it remains to 
be seen if violence and anarchy can be averted. 



Dispro- 
portion 
between 
city and 
country 
populations 



Special 
problem of 
Vienna 



212 



The New World 



The hard conditions of life in Austria after the World War and 
the hopelessness of the future led to a separatist movement in western 
Austria among the people of the Tyrol and Vorarlberg. For a further 
discussion of the matter see page 185. 



Economic 
weakness 
of Austria 



A defi- 
ciency of 
food 



The prime 
need for 
fuel 



THE ECONOMIC PLIGHT OF THE COUNTRY 

If we now turn to the distribution of the crops and other resources 
as a basis for understanding the present condition of Austria with 
its non-German elements excluded, we shall find the country left 
in a strikingly helpless condition. Unnatural as the population 
distributions appear in Figure 108, the region had one great advan- 
tage over its present condition — it was economically strong. If it 
did not produce all that it needed, at least it had the means to 
import and pay for what it lacked. Railway systems were laid out 
with regard to the trend of trade, and the fact that they are now 
crossed by international boundaries results in great inconvenience. 
In principle, the relocation of a boundary always seriously disturbs 
custom, a powerful force in economic life. 

Let us see what Austria has lost by the setting up of the new nations 
formed in part from the several fragments of former Austria. The 
Czechs were the chief producers of sugar beets. Moravia was the 
most successful farming province, standing ahead of Bohemia in this 
respect. Maize and wine were produced in the Slovene region of 
Alpine forelands ; barley was produced chiefly in Bohemia and Galicia. 
Istria was famous for its maize and wine ; Goritzia yielded wheat and 
maize. 

If we now exclude Hungary in addition to the subtractions already 
made, the situation of present-day Austria from the standpoint of food 
will be still clearer. The total wheat crop of Austria was about one 
quarter of the Hungarian crop. She must import corn, barley, wheat, 
rye, and other supplies from HungEiry, Bohemia, Russia, and Rumania, 
by way of poor railroads and along the Danube and connecting canals. 

Since Austria has been set up as a separate state, her difficulties 
have been especially increased by lack of fuel. She has to import 
practically all her coal, and she needs a million tons merely for the 
elementary purposes of heat, light, and street railways. About 
half a million tons was promised from Poland and Czecho-Slovakia 
in 1919 soon after the close of the war, but only half the promised 
quantity was delivered in that year and 1920. Nor can Austria start 
her industries again without help from outside, for she has no rubber, 



T}ie National Existence of Austria 



213 




214 



The New World 



Tendency to 
unite with 
Germany 



chemicals, fats, oil, or wool with which to supply her mills. She 
needs also copper and petroleum. There is very little iron. These 
conditions appear the more serious when we consider that Austria 
was formerly an industrial country, and 40 per cent of the total in- 
dustrigJ population of the empire hved in Austria. 

To create a trade balance, Austria must manufactiu'e and export, 
and if she is to become a strong nation, she will have to do this more 
efficiently than in the past. Working to her advantage is her posi- 
tion in central Europe. There are already in operation the canals, 
waterways, and short hauls for the products of her factories. On 
the other hand, her sea outlets are no longer open to unrestricted 
use and development ; they are in the hands of other powers. Only 
the Danube is left as a water connection with the commercial high- 
ways of the sea. It is difficult to see how Austria can create a com- 
mercial fleet under these conditions. 

It is natural that, confronted by these difficulties, the Austrian 
leaders should have turned more and more to the possibilities of a 
union with Germany. In March 1919, the National Assembly framed 
a constitution which declared that German- Austria was part of the 
German Republic. It went on to say that the union was dependent 
upon arrangements yet to be made. But the AUied and Associated 
Powers required Austria to remain a separate country, at least until 
some future time. Again on 1 October 1920 the project was revived 
by the Austrian National Assembly, which directed the government 
to carry out within six weeks a plebiscite on the union of Austria with 
Germany, but it was never held. Such action would have the special 
support of the Pan-Germans. France would always oppose the 
project because of her fear of increasing the strength of her traditional | 
enemy. For the same reason the project will be opposed by the small ' 
central European states just created, who are naturally suspicious of 
any augmentation of German power. With Austria joined to her, 
Germany would have a population of 65,000,000, as compared with 
the 64,000,000 she had before the war. 



Principal 
terms of 
the treaty 



THE TREATY BETWEEN THE ALLIED POWERS AND AUSTRIA 

According to the treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye, Austria agrees 
to the following conditions, among others : 

(1) Austria renounces all rights to territory formerly held by the 
Austro-Hungarian Empire outside the boundaries shown on 
Figure 107. This includes both the territory formerly held by 
the empire but now assigned to Jugo-Slavia, Italy, Czecho- 



The National Existence of Austria 215 

Slovakia, Poland, and Rumania, and also all her former rights 
and privileged positions in Morocco, Egypt, Siam, and China 
(concessions at Tientsin). 

(2) She agrees to abohsh universal mihtary service, promises not 
to maintain an army of more than 30,000 men (under con- 
ditions laid down by the Allies), surrenders all her war vessels 
and aircraft, and submits to limitations respecting the manu- 
facture of war material or trade in it. 

(3) She promises to deUver for trial all persons accused of acts 
in violation of the rules of war. (As in the case of Germany, 
this clause was modified so as to limit the delivery of accused 
persons to a small number of the worst cases, which would 
serve as an example.) 

(4) She acknowledges her indebtedness for the costs of the war 
and engages to pay an amount of reparation to be determined 
by the Permanent Reparations Commission, payments to ex- 
tend through a period of thirty years and to begin 1 May 
1921. (As an immediate advance she agreed to deliver live stock 
to Italy, Jugo-Slavia, and Rumania, during a period of three 
months after the coming into force of the treaty.) 

(5) She grants freedom of transit through her realm for goods and 
persons passing to or from the territories of the Allied and 
Associated Powers, who are to enjoy most-favored-nation 
treatment. The Danube from Uhn (Fig. 103) is declared an 
international river, together with all navigable parts of its 
system. The courses of the Morava and the Tisza, in so far as 
they form the frontier between Jugo-Slavia and Austria, are 
also declared international. 

(6) She is assured free access to the Adriatic, and freedom of transit 
for postal, telegraphic, and telephonic services. 

In view of the clearly defined ethnic frontier between the German Rectm- 
Austrians and the Hungarians in western Hungary, this frontier, ^ound^ 
with slight rectifications, was taken as the international boundary between 
between the two states as recognized in the treaty of St. Germain- an^AuTtria 
en-Laye. The change in boundary in western Hungary transfers 
25,000 German-speaking people to Austria. This is the only case in 
Europe where an enemy power was given additional territory, though 
it is to be noted that the gift was made at the expense of another 
enemy power — Hungary — and that Austria lost elsewhere much 
more than she gained here. 



CHAPTER TWELVE 



Difficulties 
following 
upon the 
division 
of Hun- 

gaiy 



THE NEW HUNGARY 

HuNGAEiY has existed for a thousand years. Since 1867 it has 
been joined with Austria to form the Austro-Hungarian (or "Dual") 
Empire. The chief bond of union was the Crown. Each country 
had a separate parUament, and while there was a unified tariff system 
and joint consent was required to commercial treaties with foreign 
countries, in almost every matter of common interest there was the 
most violent difference of opinion between the two kingdoms. Only 
the clear recognition of their economic interdependence prevented 
the rupture of the empire and the complete political independence of 
Hungary. They agreed only as late as 1907, and after a bitter con- 
test, to improve railway transportation conditions, each for the other's 
benefit. 

Suddenly the aims of the Hungarian nationalists were achieved 
with the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian armies in October 1918. 
Hungary became an independent state. But she was not to be consti- 
tuted of the large block of territory which she had acquired by her 
centuries-old struggle. The thousand years of Hungary's existence 
had also been in large part years of oppression for most non-Magyar 
peoples — Rumanians in Transylvania, Slovenes in Slavonia, Serbs 
in the Banat and elsewhere. The break-up of the empire offered 
these peoples an opportunity for political independence within 
roughly ethnic frontiers, and whatever the economic cost, they were 
determined to shake off Magyar rule. What they did not foresee 
was the inconvenience and disorganization that actual separation 
from Hungary would bring to the machinery of life — for themselves 
as well as their Magyar overlords. Cherished political freedom was 
won, but at a cost equal to that of a year of war. 

It was the chief argument of the Magyar leaders during the period 
of the peace treaties of Paris (1919-1920) that a people accustomed to 
living together within long-established frontiers should not be torn 
apart, lest the organized life it had taken so long to develop should 
be destroyed. A new international boundary would cut across rail- 
ways, watercourses, roads, and recognized administrative districts, 
requiring the creation of scores of new customs houses and railway 
stations ; shipments would long be confused and delayed ; food and 
fuel could not be distributed promptly and evenly; a fairly well- 
balanced production of live stock, cereals, forage, minerals, and 
manufactured goods would be impossible. 

216 



^ 



The New Hungary 



217 



I m •« to •- I 

fl cs 5 ft g _a 




218 



The New World 




Pig. 112, Population densities in Hungary. (After Wallis.) Of over one hundred principal 
centers of population (solid black) in Hungary as formerly constituted, about 12 are now trans 
ferred to Jugo-Slavia, 25 to Rumania, over 30 to Czecho-Slovakia, and about 35 remain in 
Hungary. New boundaries are shown by solid heavy lines ; the outermost line (broken) rep- 
resents the former boundary of Hungary. 



The new 
state a 
small and 
weak frag- 
ment of 
former 
Hungary 



THE DIFFICULTY OF MAINTAINING NATIONAL EXISTENCE 

The new Hungary is indeed a problem. Within its present bound- 
aries it is one of the smallest states of central Europe in both area 
(35,000 square miles — South Carolina has 30,500 square miles) and 
population (7,500,000, or 210 per square mile — ^Connecticut has 230 
per square mile). Comparison with the pre-war area of 125,600 
square miles and population of 20,900,000 (in 1910) shows a reduction 
to about one third of its former greatness. As in the case of Austria, 
a large part of the population is centered in a single city, Budapest, 
which had about 900,000 inhabitants in 1914. Of Magyars and 
closely related groups in former Hungary, 2,000,000 are left out- 
side her present boundaries. Of these the most compact group is 
composed of the Szeklers of Transylvania. 

A mountainous border (Fig. 113) has been taken away on the north, 
the east, and the extreme southwest, leaving a flat plain with httle 



1 



Tlie New Hungary 



219 



I over 1200 meters 
1 800-1200 meters 
]400- 800 meters 
] 200- 400 meters 
I I below 200 meters 




THE GEOGR. REVIEW. PEC. 1917 



HUNGARY: RELIEF 



Fig. 113. Hungary lost chiefly mountain country as a result of the war, but she also lost the • 

richest plains country, the Banat (Fig. 142), which went to Rumania and Jugo-Slavia. 

wood and practically no water power. The country has neither suf- 
ficient fuel nor the raw materials with which to produce an adequate 
supply of manufactured goods. Even before the war it imported a 
third of its coal supply. Its frontiers everywhere he upon an open 
plain. 

Can such a state survive.*^ Certainly it cannot grow unless treaty can Hun- 
arrangements permit the old currents of trade to resume their flow, ^^^Z"^' 
perhaps in modified form ; for a reasonable degree of economic pros- 
perity is the first essential to successful government. No political 
party can retain the confidence of the national parliament and man- 
age public affairs steadily unless its program rests upon a hopeful 
economic basis. This is true in Hungary as well as in Italy, or Russia, 
or Great Britain. Even with a loan with which to start her industries 
and import raw materials, it would be difficult for Hungary to avoid 
anarchy. 

It is customary to lay the blame for Hungary's plexus of evils upon causes of 
the treaty-making powers at the Peace Conference of Paris ; but it J^fg^^ 
should be remembered that the prime causes of evil are the accumu- 



220 



The New World 




Fig. 114. The city of Budapest, capital of Hungary- 

lations of centuries — oppression of non-Magyar peoples by Magyars, 
a medieval system of land tenure long discarded by France and Great 
Britain, a strangle hold upon the peasant (Magyar as well as non- 
Magyar) of the commercial system of the town, managed by powerful 
merchants, mainly Jews. Add to these causes the four anxious 
and devastating years of war and the crushing disappointments of 
defeat, and it is clear that the people of Hungary would naturally 
strike out blindly against every proposal of restraint. For a time 
there was downright Bolshevism, and then a wave of reaction toward 
a monEirchical form of government. 

MAGYAR RELATIONS WITH THE SUBJECT RACES 



The Magyars 

For hundreds of years the ruling class in Hungary has been the 
Magyars. Who are they? Whence did they come? They are a 
steppe people, originally a race of nomadic horsemen, who conquered 
the grasslands of the middle Danube basin about 895 a.d. They have 
always been a plains people and have left to others the bordering 
highlands. In the period of their early development in the grass- 
lands of Hungary, they repeatedly ravaged Europe from mid-Russia 
to westward of the Rhine. With a language totally different from 



The New Hungary 



221 




Buda on the left, Pest on the right, loo-king upstream. 

that of their neighbors and a territory bordered for long distances 
by high wooded mountains, holding the heart of the land, they 
have stood together socially and politically, alien alike in speech 
and custom from the peoples whom they conquered, — the Rumans 
of Transylvania, the Ruthenians of the central Carpathian foothills, 
the Serbs north of the Danube, and the Slovaks of Slovakia. Out of 
a total Hungarian population of 23,900,000 in 1910, the Magyars 
claimed 48 per cent, but this number is excessive. 

The Magyars' present claim to the gratitude of western European j^e Ma- 
powers rests on their long struggle with the Turk. From 1363 on, es^ as the 
when Turkish and Hungarian armies first met near Adrianople, the Europe 
conflict was almost continuous. In 1529 and again in 1683 Vienna 5Sk^* *^^ 
was besieged ; but the second siege was lifted by the help of the Polish 
leader Sobieski, and in 1699 the Sultan acknowledged the rule of the 
Hapsburgs over all Hungary and Transylvania except the Banat. 

The subject races of Hungary were separated from each other on 
the rim of the central Hungarian plain. This separation and their 
unlikeness in speech and race prevented them in times past from 
uniting to fight the Magyar. Hungarian rulers gave them neither 
freedom of the press nor the right of association. In some notable 
instances, persons who made even trivial exhibitions of non-Magyar 
sentiment were cruelly persecuted ; almost all officials were Magyeirs ; 



The New World 



Increase % 



1880 1890 1900 1910 



50- 



HUNGARY PROPER 



POPULATION GROWTH/ 



BY 



NATIONALITIES // 
// 



25- 




Magyars 
Jews 



Hungary 
Ruthenians 



Rumanians 



elections were a farce ; subject peoples 
were practically unrepresented in the 
national parliament. 

With a passion for landholding, the 
Magyar, like the landlord of feudal 
times, has occupied huge estates, and 
this system of land tenure has pressed 
most heavily upon the subject border 
peoples. In the towns the Jewish 
Magyar as merchant and banker has 
eventually dominated the peasantry 
as well as the artisan classes. The 
new boundaries have recast ethnic 
percentages in such a way as to raise 
the proportion of Jews from 5 to 7 per 
cent. 

Hungary is ringed about by enemies. 
Hatred of the Magyar is traditional 

Fig. 115. Diagram showing, by national- with the pCOplc who are nOW her 
ities, the population growth in Hungary ncighborS. EvCU in Magyaria itSClf 
proper (exclusive of Croatia-Slavonia) . • t i i n 

from 1880 to 1910. Logarithmic scale, the autocratic rulmg class has bccu 
After Waihs. hatcd by the Magyar peasantry, whose 

economic condition has been only a shade better than that of the 
subject races. The latter were also denied equality of educational 
privileges, especially in districts where they were numerically greater. 



Slovaks 

Germans 
Serbo-Croa+s 



The Rumanian and German Elements 

Of all the subject peoples of Hungary the Rumanians were the 
most numerous, 3,000,000 in all. Behind them stood the people- of 
the Rumanian nation, to whom they appealed constantly for libera- 
tion. Magyar persecution inevitably pressed hardest upon them, for 
their chances of liberation were best. If they were lost, so also 
would be lost to Hungary a milhon Szeklers and German-speaking 
subjects inhabiting the Carpathian foothill region east of Maros- 
Vasarhely and about Kronstadt (Fig. 143). Persecution was justified 
by the central Hungarian government on the ground that the Ruma- 
nians formed an illiterate peasantry incapable of ruling themselves.^ 

In late years the German element in Hungary has been declining in 
both influence and number. The scattered settlements of the German 

1 For further discussion of Transylvania see Chapter Fifteen, page 283. 



1 



The New Hungary 



223 



HUNGARY r/'T^ \J^ 
POPULATION // \ V~ H 



/" WEST-CENTRAL 
*v MOVEMENT OF THE 

Scale of miles 




migration 

□ Outward 
migration 

■«^(_) Emigration 

M Magyars 46- 
G Germans 
J Jews 



Fig. 116. Compare with Figures 123, 128, and 146 for results of Magyar oppression as a whole. 
Inward and outward migration refer to movements of population in and out of the region here 
shown in relation to the rest of Austria-Hungary, while emigration refers to movement to other 
countriss. The heavy solid lines denote present boundaries. After Wallis. 



have not tended to make him poUtically strong. Emigration has 
been chiefly to America. In all there were about 2,000,000 Ger- 
mans scattered here and there throughout Hungary. Their ancestors 
had been brought in principally during the 16th and 17th centuries in 
the process of beating back the Turk, first as frontier guards, to which 
fact witness still the German fortress-churches and the habit of stor- 
ing grain near the churches as a safeguard in case of attack. Later, 
as colonists, they received grants of lands, freedom from taxation, 
and financial assistance in house building and the stocking of their 
farms. 

Many German place names dot the map of eastern Hungary. 
Wherever the Germans have gone, they have kept their ancestral 
customs and maintained separate German schools. For the most 
part they have Uved in groups of villages. Their conservative and 
alien ways have kept racial antagonisms ahve, but it is difficult to 
see how this could have been avoided ; for on the whole they have 
represented a far more advanced type of living and could hardly have 
been expected to lower their standards to fit those of the people about 
them. Their scattered settlements form a speech mosaic very hard 
to reconcile with any principle of boundary making. 



German 
settlements 
in Him- 
gary 



The Ger- 
man colo- 
nist's dis- 
dain of his 
neighbois 



224 



TJie New World 



Ruthenians 
in Hun- 
gary an 
overflow 
from East- 
ern Galicia 



Treatment 
by the 
Magyars 



Reasons for 
assigning 
Galicia 
to Poland 



The Ruthenians of Northeastern Hungary, Eastern Galicia^ 

and Bukovina 

The Ruthenians were scarcely heard of before the World War. 
Yet there are 35,000,000 of them in central-eastern Europe, if we 
include the Ukrainians.^ In former Russia were 30,000,000 of them ; 
3,500,000 Uve in former Austria (Galicia and Bukovina chiefly), and 
500,000 in former Hungary. Those in Hungary represented an over- 
flow of Ruthenians from their homeland in Eastern Galicia and Russia, 
across the relatively low passes of the central Carpathians to the edge 
of the Hungarian plain. 

In Hungary the Magyars have pressed heavily upon the Ruthenians. 
Since 1880, every effort has been made to occupy the region with 
Magyars and thus drive a wedge between the main body of Ruthenians 
(in Galicia and the Carpathian valleys) and the Slovaks on the west. 
Education among them was discouraged by the Magyar overlords. 
Without Ruthenian schools or newspapers there was naturally a high 
percentage of illiteracy and almost no poUtical self-consciousness. 
Though incorporated with Czecho-Slovakia to the number of 475,000, 
they occupy a privileged autonomous position. 

In order to unite Poland and Rumania and combine their strength 
against Bolshevist Russia, and also to join to their kinsmen the Poles 
who dweU in the towns of Eastern Galicia, the whole of that province 
is desired by Poland. This would place about 3,000,000 Ruthenians 
(a clear majority in Eastern Galicia) under Polish rule. In the 
province of Bukovina, 300,000 of them are assigned to Rumania. 
The main body of Ruthenians in Russia formed a part of Ukrainia 
(page 400), which for a time vanished from the map with Bolshe- 
vist control of Russia, but which may return eventually.^ 



Rise of 
Bolshevism 



DISORDERS FOLLOWING THE END OF THE WORLD WAR 

In the land situation we have part explanation of the revolution 
of 1919 in Hungary and the quick growth of Bolshevism. In the 
face of approaching famine and with the collapse of the government 
that followed the abdication of the Emperor after the armistice of 
November 1918, the peasants seized the land and killed numbers of 
the landlords. Many of the larger estates were placed in the hands 
of cooperative production societies. Step by step with the disorders 

^ The word "Ruthenian " is now generally assigned only to the Ukrainians of Galicia, 
Bukovina, and former Hungary. 

^ For a discussion of the Slovaks, Jugo-Slavs, and Rumanians formerly under Hungarian 
rule see the several chapters on these nationalities. 



The New Hungary 225 

of the countryside went the disorders of the towns, where the food 
situation was even worse. Completely freed from restraint, the evil 
elernents of the population took advantage of the times to commit 
excesses. What was started in the form of a civil war, to win political 
and economic freedom, became wild disorder and crime. Karolyi 
began a sane and democratic program of reform (October 1918 to 
March 1919) ; he was succeeded by the "Reds, " or Bolshevists, under 
Bela Kun (March to August 1919), who were in turn succeeded by 
a provisional government that represents little more than a succes- 
sion of self-appointed public committees. The general tendency has 
been toward control by representatives of the old monarchical regime, 
and both Admiral Horthy and ex-Emperor Charles are thought 
possible candidates for the throne in a constitutional monarchy. 

Bolshevism in Hungary was marked by downright theft from the 
pubhc treasiuy of miUions of doUars. The money was distributed 
on the order of no central authority and without obtaining receipts. 
It is a melancholy thought that here, as in Russia, there should have 
been started a liberal movement which at once degenerated into rob- 
bery. Hope turned to disgust when the people saw that in the name 
of hberty a new and terrible burden of loss had been laid upon them. 

OCCUPATIONS BY RIVAL BORDER STATES 

The portions of Hungary that were lost to her by the terms of 
the treaty of peace were occupied during 1919 and 1920 by rival bor- 
dering states. No one of these states waited until the peace treaty 
with Hungary was signed, but against the orders of the Peace Confer- 
ence of Paris they rushed in to occupy the land they expected to 
receive. While Rumania was the most extreme and the one which 
seized and carried away the greatest amount of property, all followed 
the same general policy. 

Rumania first went beyond the demarcation line set for her armies Rumanian 
by the Alhed and Associated Powers, then passed the line of the pro- occupation 
posed new boundary, invaded central Hungary itself, and early in 
August 1919 occupied the capital, Budapest. In the two following 
months she defied the Peace Conference, and seized and sent to 
Rumania vast quantities of supplies. Her excuse was that much 
more had been requisitioned in Rumania by the Austro-Hungarian 
army authorities in the period of military occupation before the 
close of the war. 

In addition to the Rumanian advance, Hungary suffered aggression 
at the hands of two other neighbors. At Pecs the Jugo-Slavs occu- 



226 



The New World 



Similar 
occupa- 
tions else- 
where 



pied certain coal mines of Hungary without authorization. Lack of 
restraint was shown also in the acts of violence committed in the 
plebiscite area of Klagenfurt and in the occupation of Montenegro 
with several military contingents and persecution of members of the 
anti-Serbian party. Czecho-Slovakia Ukewise surpassed her demarca- 
tion line, before being authorized by the Peace Conference of Paris ; 
and, Uke the Serbians and Rumanians, she began at once to persecute 
and drive out of the newly won lands the people who had formerly 
persecuted her. The military occupation of portions of Hungary by 
Czecho-Slovakia, Rumania, and Jugo-Slavia was not discontinued 
until the summer of 1920, after the peace treaty with Hungary had 
been signed, and then only under pressure of the Allied powers. 



Hungary 
not well- 
balanced 
economically 



Hungary's 
coal de- 
posits 



The cen- 
tral plain, 
the Alfold 



AGRICULTURE AND INDUSTRY IN THE NEW HUNGARY 

The new state of Hungary is chiefly a plains country. It will have 
an excess of agricultural products for export, and it will have to import 
nearly all its manufactured goods, both now and in the future. The 
Tisza, next to the Danube the principal stream, has a fall of only a 
hundred feet in the two hundred miles from the Carpathian foothills 
to its junction with the Danube. The sources of the tributary streams 
that drain the Hungarian plain are all in foreign hands. Water power 
is therefore unavailable. 

There is no precious metal in Hungary. There are, however, several 
important deposits of coal. The reserves of the Pecs field are said 
to amount to 110,000,000 tons, and the coal is of excellent quality. 
The Jugo-Slavs wish to exploit the Pecs mines (Fig. 131) for fivfe years, 
as compensation for the destruction of their mines by the Austro- 
German armies. The losses of coal which Hungary suffers as a result 
of the new boundary arrangements aff'ect chiefly her reserve supplies, 
and she loses but a comparatively small part of the coal beds in which 
production is practicable. Of her former iron-ore deposits those left 
to her represent but a fifth of her former production (more than a 
miflion tons in 1913). All the salt resources are in the ceded lands. 

The central plain of Hungary is caUed the Alfold (Fig. 113). It 
is a western outpost of the vast Eurasian steppe, and was formed 
by the gradual silting up of a great Alpine sea, remnants of which 
survive in shallow lagoons. The climate is of an extreme continental 
type, and the Alfold, a true grass steppe, is naturally treeless, in parts 
even semi-desert. Flooding is characteristic of the streams. This is 
especially true of the Tisza, and hence few towns have arisen on its 



The New Hungary 



2^7 



BOUNDARIES IN 
THE TISZA\ALLEY 




Abandoned and. 



'Seffulatedrtver 



THEGE0GR.REVIEW.OEC.I9[7 



Fig. 117. The Alfold is the large and fertile central plain of former Hungary. Its chief river is 
the Tisza. The correction and control of the Tisza permits the use of most of the lands formerly 
flooded. The map shows the location of the new boundaries in the Tisza valley where Jugo- 
slavia, Hungary, and Rumania meet. To reach the Danube a barge at Nagyvarad must pass 
through a corner of Hungary. Note the manner in which the boundary between Jugo-Slavia 
and Rumania in the Banat (west of Temesvar) crosses the streams. These inconveniences were 
considered less important than alternative railroad questions (see Figure 135). Modified from 
map in the Geographical Review, December 1917. 

banks. Szeged, the chief town on the river, was practically destroyed 
by flood in 1879. Between the Danube and the Tisza are patches of 
lagoon and some rather extensive arid, sandy tracts. 

The influence of the drainage network on the life of the low-lying where the 
plain is shown in a number of striking ways. The people live mainly fhe Ausid 
on the intermediate levels. East of the Tisza, floods are frequent live 



228 



The New World 




Fig. 118. A comparison of former (broken) and present (solid) boundary lines shows what Hun- 
gary has lost. 

and dry house sites are not easy to find. Long stretches of the 
Danube, the Tisza, the Maros, the Drave, and the Save serve as 
county boundaries. 

Nearly three fourths of the people of Hungary derived their living 
from the land. In the region east of the Tisza, noted for its wheat 
and maize, the yield of wheat equals that on the best wheat lands of 
England and northeastern France. Sugar beets, potatoes, and oats 
also are grown extensively, both east and west of the Danube. Cattle 
are raised everywhere. The boundary line of greatest productivity 
tends to foUow the limit of Magyar speech at the edge of the Transyi- 
vanian Mountains. 

Reduced to the limits of the new boundaries Hungary becomes a 
still ore exclusively agricultural state. Though she loses the maize 
and wheat lands of the Backa and the Banat and the barley and 
sugar beet fields and rich pastures of the Little Alfold north of the 
Danube, the area of good agricultural land is higher in proportion 
to the population. The population is reduced approximately to 35 
per cent. Wheat and rye are 40 per cent and 62 per cent respectively 



The New Hungary 



229 



Scale 1:8 250 000 



y-L.r-^? 



DISTRIBUTION FARM ANIMALS 

(pS^^ufrelle) Cattle Horses Pi|s Sheep 

over 75 Al A2 

50-75 B I B 2 

25-50 CI C2 




HUNGARY: DISTRIBUTION OF FARM ANIMALS IN 1910 



Fig. 119. Losses due to the creation of new states are suggested by the difference between 
the present (.solid) and the former (broken) boundaries of Hungary. 

of former yields, barley 47 per cent, maize 27 per cent, and sugar 
beets 37 per cent. Such a proportion of crop yield to population 
might seem to indicate a very favorable situation, but it should be 
remembered that agricultural products are almost the only source of 
exports to pay for imported goods. 

With the loss of the Carpathian and Transylvanian country Hun- other losses 
gary loses not only mineral resources and sources of water power, ^"^.^^^ 
but the great proportion of her valuable forests. Instead of export- 
ing timber, she will have to import it. 

Before the World War Hungary had 3750 large manufacturing situation 
establishments, of which she retains 2155 ; but many of these, being 
deprived of their sources of raw materials, are now idle. . 

Hungary has only a quarter of the former capacity to support 
sheep, and wool production will fall off accordingly ; and at least 
half the required woolens must be imported. Cattle production falls 
to 31 per cent, horses to 40 per cent, and pigs to 44 per cent. Of 
hemp, with the pre-war figure cut to 15 per cent, not enough to 
supply the spindles is left. Two thirds of the flax lands have gone, 



with respect 
to manu- 
factures 



230 



The New World 



Hungary's 
effort to 
form an 
alliance 
with Jugo- 
slavia 



42 per cent of the spindles, and 84 per cent of the weaving looms. 
Nearly three fourths of the glass works will be lost. 

A review of these facts will show that Hungary presents a strong 
contrast to the new states that border her. They have won their 
long fight for Hberty. They have thus solved one of their main prob- 
lems, which to Hungary is still a riddle, a question mark. They have 
almost no debt : Hungary has a pre-war debt, a war debt, and an in- 
demnity bill. The Magyar nobleman points proudly to a thousand 
years of history; but he suffers from the reaction to the accumu- 
lated woes of that long time and at the hands of those whom he 
systematically oppressed. 

One result of the Rumanian invasion of Hungary was to arouse 
such bitterness in that state that the government attempted unsuc- 
cessfully to form an alliance with Jugo-Slavia. This alliance would 
give Hungary the privilege of exchanging agricultural products on 
a complementary basis and would give her a better chance to secure 
adequate commercial outlets at Saloniki and on the Adriatic. Such 
a project is bound to be revived, for the geographical layout and 
the natural economic tendencies of the region call for cooperative 
tariff and transportation agreements not only between Hungary and 
Jugo-Slavia but also between Hungary and all her neighbors. 



CHAPTER THIRTEEN 

THE DOMAIN OF THE CZECHO-SLOVAKS 

The country of the Czecho-Slovaks runs in an east-west direction The national 
athwart a network of raih-oads that carry most of the commerce of ^°^^^ 
central Europe. It is bordered by five nations, of which three (Ru- 
mania, Poland, and Germany) touch the sea, and of which two (Aus- 
tria and Hungary) are, hke itself, landlocked states bordering the 
Danube River. Of its 14,000,000 inhabitants 35 per cent are of dif- 
ferent race or language : about 4,000,000 Germans, of whom 1,700,000 
are in western Rohemia and other powerful groups in Silesia, Moravia, 
and the larger cities ; 750,000 Magyars in Slovakia ; 400,000 Ruthe- 
nians in the eastern districts bordering the Carpathians. 

The state is a peninsula of Slavdom thrust westward into the heart a siavk 
of Europe, a long and very narrow strip impossible to defend in its P^^^^uia 
entirety against aggressive and more powerful neighbors, should it 
ever come to blows with them. Two long pincers of German popu- 
lation press upon it, the Germans of Silesia and the German-Aus- 
trians northeast of Vienna. Five nations, all at one time or another 
hostile, stand about its borders. It has no seaport, and its people 
own no railroad to the sea, from which it is distant more than 200 
miles (Rohemia to Trieste or Stettin). Its central part is only from 
50 to 125 miles across from north to south, yet from east to west the 
country extends 600 miles. Its area is 55,000 square miles, or slightly 
more than that of the state of New York. Its population density is 
also not far from that of New York. 

From whatever angle we view the foregoing 'facts, we are forced importance 

to conclude that the welfare of Czecho-Slovakia is to an extraordinarv ?^ i^te^na- 

. . . , , *^ tionai re- 

degree dependent upon its international relationships. From the lationsWps 

first, the statesmen of this new nation must face political questions staS^"*'' 
of the gravest and most complex character. Almost before the new 
government was organized it had two serious quarrels on its hands : 
one with Poland over the coal lands of Teschen, and one with Hun- 
gary over the conditions of the military demarcation fine east of 
Pressburg. 

Retween Czecho-Slovakia and its neighbors there must needs de- Possible 
velop a bond of union in one form or another. This bond may take co^era- 
the form of commercial treaties respecting tariifs, transportation rates, ^°° 
and exchange of products, such as are now under discussion ; indeed, 
two have already been ratified, those with Poland and Jugo-Slavia. 

231 



2S-Z 



The New World 



Problem of 
the minori- 
ties 



It may take the form of a treaty based on a military alliance with 
Poland and Jugo-Slavia, two other Slav states (page 241). It 
may take the form of a waterways convention with the other 
Danubian states — Austria, Hungary, Rumania, Jugo-Slavia, and 
Bulgaria. Or it may be that a treaty will be arranged affecting the 
use of railways, canals, maritime ports, and other mstruments of 
trade, with all the other central European states. If these results 
should be achieved on a friendly basis, the economic weKare of the 
country would be assured; for, like several other new states of 
Europe, Czecho-Slovakia enters upon its national career with a rela- 
tively small debt (about a half billion dollars). 

The question of the treatment of peoples of different race and 
speech within the new state is likewise fraught with danger. That 
too may be settled upon the basis of justice or it may become the 
source of bitter and disastrous irredentism. The German-speaking 
populations wiU offer the greatest difficulties (Fig. 120). They will 
resist the overlordship of the Czechs if Czech rule is accompanied 
by unjust discrimination against them. (A harmonizing factor is the 
long-standing economic interdependence of Czechs and Germans in 
the principal towns of Bohemia and in just those districts where the 
Germans are most numerous, as in western Bohemia.) The Magyars 
of Slovakia will fight before yielding to Czech or Slovak exploita- 
tion. These are fundamental facts ; in them may he the seeds of 
failure and of future weir. By forming a voting coafition in the na- 
tional parHament, the non-Czech parties could leave the Czechs with 
so narrow a margin of control that vital measures for national security 
and development would frequently be endangered. 

The welding of the parts of Czecho-Slovakia into a strong state is 
difficult also on account of the diversity of languages. Although 
Slovak and Czech are much alike, there is in reality no such thing 
at the present time as a " Czecho-Slovak " language. Czech is the 
omcial language for meetings, conferences, and oral and written 
official communications. Where racial minorities number 20 per 
cent of the population, however, they may use their own language 
before judicial and administrative bodies, provided they are citizens 
of Czecho-Slovakia. 



THE HISTORICAL STRUGGLE 

Begimiings The independence of Czecho-Slovakia was formally proclaimed 
^^govem- during the World War, on 18 October 1918, though earlier informal an- 
nouncements were made in 1917. Even before the Austro-Hungarian 



The Domain of the Czeclto-Slovaks 



233 




IS § n 

•^ o m 3 

o "^ 



H +» 



CI tn 
S3 ^ 



o5 a s " 

■o g ^-^ ^ o 



03 



,tu 



Jiii 

aj m c3 



o3 o "i 



;Ofq 



-•S .CO 
•Jh -t^ to 0) _: 



CD O 



li* 



■*^ ,^ o 



o-g $ gHCiH 



JP QJ O 

'-'CO. 

•C -r ^ 



* ?, ri 






4— t^' o ^ 



IS -r .ti s s .s 

o 3 -t^ <C ^ 
O.r- t^t>. gW 

o ca •« '^ M 



'^'SK 






^ .- 
bO m 

s || 

O 03 > 

f2 .si 

, u 

•tJ a) 

•SO 



234 



The New World 




oMbscow 
551 



Scale of miles 

so 100 200 300 



Fig. 121. Slavs in Europe outside Russia. The common boundary of Poland and Russia 
was tentatively laid down at the Riga peace conference in October 1920. The key to the 
numbers is as follows: 1, Poles; la, mixed Poles and Ruthenians; \h, White Russians; 
2, Czechs, Moravians, Slovaks; 3, Ruthenians; 4, Serbo-Croats ; 4a, Slovenes; 5, Bulgarians 
(originally Finno-Ugrian but now principally Slavic) ; 6, Macedonians. 

armistice of 4 November 1918 was signed, the new state had formed 
a provisional democratic government and had been recognized by the 
Allies. The returning soldiers formed an army to protect the still un- 
defined frontiers from disorder. Money was borrowed to begin the 
operations of government. The United States, Great Britain, France, 
and Italy gave the new country credit and supplies. Masaryk be- 
came prime minister and minister of finance, and later the first presi- 
dent. 

The new state has the benefit of stirring traditions and also of the 



The Domain of the Czecho-Slovaks 235 

recent heroic exploits in Russia, which form one of the great epics of Epic of the 
the World War. During the fighting on the Russian front in 1916- ^i^^^^l ■ 
1917, tens of thousands of Czecho-Slovak soldiers surrendered to their Russia 
brother Slavs, the Russians. They were organized into armies in the 
prison camps, but before they could be brought into the field Russia 
had become Bolshevist, and the Czecho-Slovak corps opposed not 
Austrians, but Russians. For many months they fought unceas- 
ingly against the Bolshevist armies, all the way from central Russia 
eastward along the Siberian raihoad to Vladivostok. Only after 
several years of exile were they returned, late in 1919, to their native 
land. 

The achievements of the new Czecho-Slovak nation appear the Long 
more remarkable when we consider that the people have been under ^^^^uTtria 
foreign rule for nearly four hundred years and that the present gen- 
eration has had very little experience in government. From the 10th 
century Bohemia was under the influence of Germany, and several 
of its kings became emperors of Germany. Doubtless the Czechs 
could have been won to either people — the German or the Austrian 
— by benevolent measures ; but the general policy of severity towEo-d 
minorities of different race never permitted the ruhng castes in the two 
states to tolerate political liberty, even in the form of local autonomy. 

While primarily a Roman Cathohc country, Bohemia was the seat ReUgious 
of a bitter rehgious war in the early part of the loth century, when '^"^ 
John Huss, who had led the popular demand for clerical reform, was 
tried by an ecclesiastical council and burned (1415). A civil war 
broke out which was to divide Bohemia for many years and cause 
the loss of a large part of her people. When the struggle began^ 
one third of the soil of Bohemia belonged to the clergy, and the taxes 
levied by church and state were intolerable. It was therefore easy 
for the rehgious question to become joined with the question of land 
tenure. Since the land question affected the peasants (chiefly 
Czechs), the movement of John Huss and his foUowers became also 
a peasant movement ; and since the welfare of all the peasants was 
involved, it soon became a national movement. It is interesting to 
note that Germans held almost all the ecclesiastical offices, and the 
problem of race was thus added to the problems of religion and land 
tenure. 

Ranged against the Bohemians were the Catholic princes of the 
neighboring countries, who argued that if religious liberty were 
tolerated in Bohemia it would surely assume dangerous forms else- 
where. Coupled with this view was the fear of the Hapsburg kings 



236 



The New World 



Battle of 
the White 
Mountain 



that their claim, made in 1526, to the Bohemian crown would be 
denied as soon as the principle of nationalism began to grow in the 
soil of religious hberty. 

The question of the Bohemian language and hterature was closely 
tied up with that of religious differences. It was in the Bohemian 
language that some of the severest denunciations of the clergy were 
written, and some of the most violent attacks upon the tyranny of 
nobles and kings. German officials secured control of the University 
of Prague and thereby sought to denationalize Bohemia, and to impose 
the German language and secure its dominance. 

At just this period there was a division of the Papacy between 
Rome and Avignon which caused a division of authority and opinion, 
both pohtical and religious, in many centers of the Christian world. 
In the Bohemian church the division was seized upon by the one 
party to impress German authority, and by the other to hasten the 
day of the national independence of Bohemia. 

The Catholic countries of Spain, Poland, and Bavaria aided Aus- 
tria, and in the invasion of Bohemia the nationalist Bohemian forces 
were defeated at the battle of the White Mountain in 1620. Follow- 
ing the defeat the Protestant clergy of Prague were obliged to sell 
their goods and go into Saxony. Censorship of the press was 
established, statues of Huss were destroyed or altered, Protestants 
could not secure good titles to their land; in short, the movement 
to Catholicize Bohemia was really a movement to destroy its national 
aspirations. Towns that resisted were deprived of their charters. 
Thereafter Bohemian nationality was promoted very largely outside 
of Bohemia. 

The battle of the White Mountain and its tragic rehgious and po- 
litical associations are mentioned here because they assist our under- 
standing of the present spirit of the Czechs as well as of other central 
European nationalities to whom the facts of history have a poignant 
significance. As a certain Czech statesman put it after the Czech 
forces had advanced into Magyar territory in northern Hungary : 
"We have now revenged the pain and grief of the great numbers of 
emigrants who fled after the battle of the White Mountain." But this 
battle was fought three hundred years ago ! If all the wrongs of the 
past must become bitter traditions to be revenged sometime in the 
future, then Hungary may choose to remember alleged wrongs of the 
present and revenge herself three hundred years hence — or sooner. 
This is one of the terrible problems of the moment : Where is the 
process of hating to stop ? 



The Domain of the Czecho- Slovaks 



^37 




238 



The New World 



Literary 
revival 



Forms of 
Austrian 
oppression 



Elements 
of sta- 
bility 



The suppression of the Hberal movement of 1848, and the wars of 
1866 and 1870, were steps in the progress of that Austro-German 
dominion of Bohemia which continued until 1918. The hope of free- 
dom might have been altogether lost but for the stimulation of na- 
tional consciousness and sentiment in the 19th century, when a few 
Czech patriots revived the almost-forgotten literature. Jan KoUar 
(1793-1852) inspired his people by a collection of poems called Slavy 
Dcera, or Daughter of Slavia; Safafik (1795-1861) wrote Slavic 
Aniiquiiies and Slavic Ethnography; Palacky (1798-1876) was the 
author of A History of the Bohemian People. 

The struggle for independence in later years was often focused 
upon the question of the Bohemian language. On the one hand 
the insistence upon German speech was a constant attempt to deny 
equality of race as expressed in the national language ; on the other it 
represented a repression of religious hberty which carried with it the 
persistent denial of civil liberty. Though Bohemia is largely a 
Catholic country today, most Bohemians have resented for centuries 
the measures taken by foreign princes to weed out Protestants by 
expelling them from the country (as in 1627). Only in this way 
did the rulers think it possible to kill the feeling of independence, 
which would inevitably lead to a separate national life. Instead of 
equahzing the German and Bohemian languages, the Hapsburg over- 
lords prejudiced the latter by appointing only German-speaking 
officials and encouraging the growth of a German aristocracy. So 
fierce was the struggle between Czechs and Germans that the Pro- 
vincial Diet of Bohemia was practically closed for some years before 
the World War. 

The more numerous the repressive measures, the fiercer raged the 
struggle on the part of Bohemian students to prove a long-estab- 
lished nationalist sentiment. Archaeological facts were brought to 
light proving that Bohemian culture had an independent or autoch- 
thonous origin ; manuscripts were discovered which revealed a liter- 
ary culture unmarked by German influence ; every distinctive social 
and political phase of the past was set in high rehef by the" intense 
patriotism of Bohemian scholars. 

INITIAL DANGERS TO THE NEW STATE 

The Czechs have shown remarkable strength of purpose and a 
reasonable temper. Like all Slavs, they have extremely volatile 
elements in the population, so much so thai it was for a short time a 
question whether they would be able to resist the Bolshevism they 



The Domain of the Czecho-Slovaks 



239 




Fig. 123. The process of Magyarization in Slovakia. Out of 20 districts, 12 had incoming 
streams of Magyars, and 17 had outgoing streams of Slovaks of which 13 were emigrants and 
4 migrants to other parts of Austria-Hungary. Education in Slovakia is on a very low level, 
and while the outgoing streams of Slovaks consisted chiefly of peasants the inconaing educated 
Magyars comprised officials, l^rge landowners, and capitalists. From Wailis, the Geographical 
Review, September 1918, with new boundaries added. 

had so heroically fought in Russia and thus keep the friendship of 
the western powers. The protection which these powers can give 
Czecho-Slovakia is yet to be measured. Up to the present the Czechs 
have had chiefly to depend upon themselves. When their chspute 
with the Poles over the coal mines of Teschen brought them to the 
verge of war, the Allies sent an Interallied commission which demar- 
cated a line of division for the armed forces, regulated coal production 
and shipment, and kept the peace. 

On the south, also, the Czechs had the support of the Allies during AiUed teip 
1919, through operations which kept Hungary's attention focused 
on her southwestern borders. Detachments of the French Army 
of the Orient under General Franchet d'Esperey were sent into Bul- 
garia and Transylvania; the Rumanians occupied a part of the de- 
marcation line on the western border of Transylvania, where Hun- 
garian troops sought to retain a hold over Rumanian districts and 
towns; a British admiral held the gateways of the Danube and 
operated a fleet of river monitors and coal barges. Held in the grip 
of the Allies on the south, Hungary could exert only feeble efl'ort 
on the north. The new Czecho-Slovak armies maintained a frontier 
along the line established by the Allies after the armistice. Austria 
could offer no resistance at all. Thus the new state has come up to 
the present without invasion or Bolshevism or discredit. It appears 
to have real political and social vitality. 

An important source of anxiety to the Allies is the degree to which Relations 
Czecho-Slovakia may form political or economic relations with Russia, an^ sym- 
"Race" may be a powerful factor in political affairs, and is stiUmore with Russia 



to new na- 
tions in 
central 
Europe 



240 



Tlie New World 



powerful in the field of economic development. A Czech leader, 
Kramer, stated (1920) that the war could not be said to be over until 
the Russian question had been settled, that the Czechs should remem- 
ber that they also were Slavs, and that they should remain faithful 
to Russia so that Russia might not have to seek alliance with Ger- 
many. He added that future relations with Russia would depend 
largely upon general European conditions. Renes, the Czech pre- 
mier, likewise favors closer relations with Russia, but never on a 
visionary basis. He says, " The individual states . . . are not self- 
sufficing, and in the Europe of the future they cannot be." 

The Czechs were for some time ambitious to have direct territorial 
connection with Russia. It is for this reason that they have opposed 
the Polish ownership of Eastern Galicia. In the summer of 1919 
there was organized in Prague, the capital ©f Czecho-Slovakia, a 
Ruthenian society which has for its object the promotion of the in- 
terests of the Ruthenians of eastern Czecho-Slovakia and of Eastern 
Galicia. Thus the state of Czecho-Slovakia is in a position to make 
trouble for Poland in the government of several millions of unfriendly 
Ruthenians northeast of the Carpathians. 

Yet Czecho-Slovakia and Poland, in spite of differences, are likely 
to become good neighbors, because they are similar in "race " at least, 
and they are both opposed to Germany. Moreover, their frontiers 
are exposed to German attack, and neither is strong enough to stand 
alone against the possible German armies of the future. The Czechs 
are more materialistic and less imaginative and romantic than the 
Poles. Poland's history is largely the history of her landed nobility ; 
Rohemia has been historically a land of peasant farmers, like Austria. 

Like all the other new states of Europe, Czecho-Slovakia will run 
the risk of becoming militaristic. It would be possible for an ambi- 
tious military man to throw the Czechs into a state of nervous dis- 
order and feed the spirit of war ; he could point to long and exposed 
frontiers ; he could dwell upon the greed and ill-will of unscrupulous 
neighbors. It was the "exposed" position of Germany that was the 
theme of her Junkers for a generation ; the idea of the menace of the 
slow-encroaching Slav became fixed in the minds of the German 
people. Following this line of reasoning, every people in the world 
should have a powerful and aggressive army and navy and be pre- 
pared for war at any minute, even though the cost of such prepara- 
tion be staggering. 

The problem is not one for the Czecho-Slovak state to solve alone. 
If rehef is not found in the plan of a League of Nations which will 



The Domain of the Czecho- Slovaks 241 

compel reduction of armaments and keep the peace of the world, it ADanu- 
will have to be found in regional alliances designed for the same pur- ^'^° *^°°" 

m T • 1 1 1 • 11 o federation 

pose. To some politiced students this would seem a feasible plan 
for the states on the Danube, which have a common bond of economic 
and military interest. A "Danubian Confederation" might thus 
be created in place of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire, to include 
also Jugo-Slavia, Rumania, and Bulgaria. /^Significant in this rela- 
tion is the "Little Entente" formed by an accord between Czecho- 
slovakia, Jugo-Slavia, and Rumania.^ It was designed for protection 
against Hungarian aggression directed toward Rumania and Jugo- 
Slavia, to promote trade on the Danube, and as a defense against 
Bolshevism should the Soviet armies pass Russia's western frontier. 
Treaties pending between Austria and Czecho-Slovakia, Bulgaria and 
Greece, Rumania and Hungary, Jugo-Slavia and Austria, Poland, 
Rumania, and Hungary, though involving complex and even con- 
tradictory political relations, carry at least the promise of a general 
accord in promoting peace and reviving trade through regional 
agreements of broad character which would still leave each national 
group independent. 

POLITICAL PROBLEMS DEPENDING ON RACIAL ELEMENTS 

The chief economic and social difficulties of Czecho-Slovakia are : New roads 

(1) The making of loans to build new roads, railroads, and canals, division of 
and to run the machinery of goverimient. the land 

(2) The execution of a program of social reform. 

(3) The reform of the land-tenure system, to break up the huge 
feudal estates that still exist. 

As seen by its leaders, the first and principal task of the new state czecho- 
is in the field of social reform. This is conceived not as a revolu- Slovakia's 
tionary but rather as an evolutionary process, not a radical break social re- 
but a gradual development. In this view the efiiciency, the enter- f°f.™ ®^°' 

^ ... . lutionary, 

prise, and the brains of capitalism are to be continued (not destroyed not revoiu- 
or discouraged, as in Russia), that there maybe wholesale production ^^^'^ 
of goods for consumption and export. In the Czecho-Slovak view, 
socialization does not mean a radical change whereby the state ex- 
propriates private property in order to set up state capitalism. With 
Russia's example before them, the Russophile Czechs might have 
been thought capable of uncritical acceptance of the Russian pro- 
gram. Even with so radical a difference of political and social 
views between the Russian and Czech leaders, the relations might 



242 



The New World 



Elements of 

political 

diversity 



have been far closer — to the detriment of the latter — had there 
been better means of communication. 

The mixed composition of the Czecho-Slovak people provides 
elements of almost certain pohtical difficulty. The Czechs and 
Slovaks together form 65 per cent of the population, while the other 
nationalities number 35 per cent. In the spring of 1920 the first 
election was held for representatives in the National Assembly. Out 
of the total of 300 deputies, the Czechs command 147 votes and the 
other groups 153 votes, of which 41 are Slovak and 70 are German, 
described by the prime minister of Czecho-Slovakia as "resentful and 
powerful." 

In the Czecho-Slovak state it is not thought possible to grant auton- 
omy to Slovakia, owing to the mixed character of the population. 
Only 60 per cent of the people of this district are Slovaks; a 
quarter are Magyars; 8 per cent are Germans, and 7 per cent are 
Ruthenians. The total population is about 3,000,000. Therefore in 
any local Slovak parliament there would be a bare majority of Slovak 
members. In a crisis involving the Czechs, Slovakia might lean 
toward Hungary in a way that. would imperil the existence of Czecho- 
slovakia. Thus there is added still another to the many weaknesses 
that affect the destiny of the new state. 



REGIONAL DIVISIONS 

Contrasts '^^^ loi^g' uarrow shape of the land of Czecho-Slovakia leads to 

between scrious difficulties as regards government, transportation, and even 
and Slovaks Security, the more serious in that the Slovak peasant, who as a rule is 
ignorant and fives primitively, has little in common with the Czech, 
who has a high level of general culture, is democratic, and yet does 
not know how to govern tactfully. In Bohemia literacy is extremely 
high ; in Slovakia it is as low as in Russia. The two peoples have a 
common literary language and the differences in vernacular are so 
slight that each can understand the other without difficulty. Politi- 
cally they have nearly always been separate, and since 1031 they 
have not enjoyed political union. They are held together now, not 
so much by a desire for union as from the sympathies of a common 
struggle — the Czechs against the Slavs and the Slovaks against the 
Magyars. The Slovaks speak of the Czechs as "the Prussians of 
the Slavs." A Slovak revolt against the Czechs is not impossible, 
and should it succeed it would probably be followed by an attempt 
on the part of the Slovaks to form an independent state. 

Bohemia, the land of the Czechs, is a basin-plain, bordered by 



The Domain of the Czechoslovaks 



24^ 




i!3i5^^«VN 



Fig. 124. Regional divisions of Czecho-Slovakia (light broken lines), international boundaries 
(heavy solid lines), and plebiscite areas (heavy broken lines). For a proposed disposition of 
Teschen and the two enclosed areas southeast of it, see Figure 179. 



fertile mountain valleys and underlain in part by deposits of coal, 
lignite, and iron, as well as nickel, cobalt, and copper. More than 90 
per cent of its land is agriculturally productive. It not only is rich 
by natural endowment, but also has highly developed metal indus- 
tries, clothing mills, paper mills, etc. Its glass is famous the world 
over. Its silver and leather work have a long history. With the 
addition to the state of the coking coal of Teschen, which provides 
half the total fuel supply, it is industrially independent — perhaps as 
well balanced in this respect as any state in Europe. 

The difference between Czechs and Moravians (Fig. 124) is very 
slight. Their physical features are not greatly different ; the Mora- 
vian dialects vary but little from the speech of the Czechs of Bohemia. 
This is the more surprising when we recall the isolation of their 
mountain environment and the differences that such an environment 
commonly produces. It is the closely similar speech of the three 
Slav groups composing Czecho-Slovakia, as weU as their common 
oppression by the Hapsburgs, that has helped to weld them into one 
nation. 

The Moravians are mostly farmers. They number about 1,800,000, 
and scattered among them are 735,000 Germans whose ancestors, 
coming by way of the valley of the March, which drains the heart 
of the country, settled on the border heights and in the towns, many 
of which they fortified (600 to 700 years ago). The German element 
is better educated and is the stronger industrially, because it has 
capital and technical education. The Germans are a class apart. 
Antagonisms between them and the Moravians have grown, not 



The Bo- 
hemian 
basin 



Close re- 
semblance 
of the 
" North- 
ern Slavs " 



The people 
of the Mo- 
ravian 
country 



'244 



The New World 



Land of the 
Slovaks 



Oppression 
of the 
Slovaks 



lessened, with time. Religious differences also have had a share in 
keeping the races in a hostile attitude, for while the Moravians 
themselves are largely Protestant, most of the Germans in Moravia 
are Roman Catholic. 

Slovakia, in the east, is a rough and more thinly populated coun- 
try. The forested mountain land was, in earlier years, a natural ref- 
uge of the Slovaks. The people live in valleys separated by ridges 
that run southward to the edge of the Hungarian plain. The streams 
flow southward into the Danube. We may say that physically the 
country faces south, but politically it faces west. There are but 
two railway lines connecting it with Moravia and Bohemia. It 
is a land of small towns, farmers, shepherds, and lumbermen, rather 
than a land of mills, shops, cities, and railroads. 

The Slovaks are the least important and the least capable of the 
three Slav groups that compose Czecho-Slovakia — the Czechs, 
Moravians, and Slovaks. None of the subject races of Hungary 
has been so much oppressed as they. There was for years a steady 
flow of Magyars into the lands of the Slovaks, where they took the 
places of Slavs who emigrated in large numbers to foreign countries. 



The Danube 
outlet 



ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF AN INTERIOR STATE 

Like Switzerland and Hungary, Czecho^rSlovakia is a landlocked 
state. It borders the Danube for less than a hundred miles, and this 
river, as we have seen, flows past so many other states that it is not a 
Czech stream as the Seine is French or as the Volga is Russian. To 
improve the facilities for water transportation, the Moldau and other 
tributaries of the Elbe have been canalized, although a great commerce 
cannot be developed on the Elbe until a deeper channel is provided 
in Saxony and Bohemia. With these and other improvements, the 
cheap export of goods would be favored. Further assistance is given 
by provisions in the treaty of Versailles for the export of Czech goods 
over Genran rivers (chiefly the Elbe) and from German ports, where 
it is stipulated Czecho-Slovakia shall have the privilege of making 
installations and shall enjoy rights of a special character. The im- 
portance of this is seen in the fact that before 1914 three times as 
much Austro-Hungarian commerce flowed through Hamburg as 
through Trieste, though special customs arrangements were respon- 
sible for part of this result. 

If the AUies can enforce the international agreements they have 
signed respecting freedom of transit from one state across the terri- 



The Domain of the Czecho- Slovaks 



245 



' "*==^ji^\Xheben NeuSorf V . '''/Y\ 


latzersdorf 


c:i^ iSkTheben ^^ ^ff 


=— ' 




^ 


WolfM^^^^^^^J^^^^^^ l^T 




'^^ \ 


'••• if%l^Z^^\^ Jk v\ ^\ 

•— — New boundary "''"'v^ 'V(f 'c-'^^^T" (w7 


-Antoniealiof 


Austria and Hungary / ^'%^' ^^ vV^^V 


Scale of miles / ^^^ ^^)^.-^V7=^v 


^J^ V* 



tory of a neighboring L\ \ ¥ \ ^ '^ .^^ Right of ac- 

state, the interior na- fT^^^^^ V < ^ .^ '^izersdorf JJ^'*°*^^ 
tions will not suffer be- 
cause they do not them- 
selves own ports and 
railways to them. It 
is provided that "goods 
and persons and means 
of transport" shall have 
free passage to the nat- 
ural outlets of each 
country. This means 
in a sense a limitation 
of sovereignty of the 

state that owns such Fig. 125. Details of boundary arrangements in the region of 

1 f . U + +1 Pressburg, Czecho-Slovakia's port on the Danube. For gen- 

an outlet port , nut tne gj-ai relations see Figure 126. Germans constitute 42 per cent 

alternative would be °^ *^® population of Pressburg, and Magyars 40 per cent. 

annoying servitudes imposed upon interior states by stronger neigh- 
bors holding the coastal outlets, such for example as the servitudes 
formerly imposed upon Switzerland by Italy and Germany (page 183). 

Should the arrangement with regard to transport of goods become 
effective, Czecho-Slovakia would have fuU rights of transit on the 
Danube, on the canals joining its streams to the Elbe, and on the Elbe 
itself, and the reasonable use of the ports of Danzig, Trieste, and 
Fiume, as well as Hamburg and Stettin. It is likely that the trade 
of the country will be chiefly with (1) agricultural Rumania and 
Hungary, whence must come much of Czecho-Slovakia's deficit in 
cereals and meat, (2) industrial Germany, and (3) agricultural and 
pastoral Jugo-Slavia. 

The position of Czecho-Slovakia as well as her industrial power Future 
will make her one of the most important of the states of central f^rnew 
Europe. She is near agricultural nations like Hungary and Russia; state 
she can supply many of the needs of the Balkans for manufactured 
wares ; she was not ravaged by the World War like Poland, Belgium^ 
and Serbia. She has from 85 to 90 per cent of the soft coal and 60 
per cent of the iron ore of former Austria. She made three fourths 
of all the shoes manufactured in the whole of Austria-Hungary, 
exporting largely to the Balkans and Russia. Moravia is a great 
producer of wool ; Slovakia is rich in agricultural and forest resources ; 
the Teschen mines supply an excellent coking coal. Prague and 
Pilsen are among the great industrial centers of Europe. Banks 



Percentages 



246 The New World 

have been organized and opened in the largest towns ; unemployment 
is already a thing of the past; the people have accepted the new 
government and loyally uphold its laws. 
Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia (that is, Austrian Silesia) together 
of ° formed about one fourth of Austria, not including Hungary. Yet 
product^* they produced 35 per cent of the wheat, 59 per cent of the barley, 48 
per cent of the rye, 90 per cent of the sugar beets, 32 per cent of the 
potatoes. If we consider acreage, we find that these three regions 
produced from 10 to 100 per cent more of a given crop per acre than 
the rest of Austria. Bohemia alone produced 80 per cent of the for- 
mer yield of hops in Austria, half of the flax and textile fiber, and 75 
per cent of the fruit. Among these products sugar is one of the most 
important from the standpoint of international trade. Czecho- 
slovakia was the only sugar-exporting country of Europe in 1919. 
In 1912-1913 (a normal year) Bohemia and Moravia had the one 
5 and the other 7 per cent of its cultivated soil in sugar beets, and 
together they produced 8 per cent of the world's total. 

The addition of Slovakia to the Czecho-Slovak republic greatly 
increases the national wealth. Of the whole Czecho-Slovak pro- 
duction, Slovakia provides 39 per cent of the wheat, 35 per cent of 
the barley, 87 per cent of the maize, 32 per cent of the potatoes, 86 
per cent of the sheep, and 26 per cent of the cattle, in addition to im- 
portant crops of tobacco, flax, and wine. Considering area, however, 
Slovakia has a lower per acre production than Bohemia ; hence the 
inclusion of Slovakia within the new state brings down the average 
production per acre. Slovakia includes some of the most important 
oats and barley lands of former Hungary. 
Czecho- Several of the chief railways of Europe cross Czecho-Slovakia. The 

Slovakia Unes from Berlin to Vienna, from Warsaw to Trieste, from Switzer- 
rauway land to Poland, all pass through her larger towns. She can reach 
E^ope ^o\\\ the Elbe and the Danube by canals. Prague will become one 
of the greatest of the cities of central Europe. But as a whole, and 
especially in its eastern part, the country is still in need of railways 
to develop its varied natural resources. 

The external economic arrangements of the state are in process of 
rapid adjustment. New commercial treaties with Bulgaria and 
Rumania are under discussion. By treaty with Poland the regular 
delivery of petroleum is assured, and .commercial arrangements have 
also been made with Hungary. With Germany a treaty has been con- 
cluded wnich provides for the exchange of potash salts, delivered to 
Czecho-Slovakia, and coal, dehvered to Germany. 



The Domain of the Czecho-Slovaks 



247 




• 1* ^ PI 2 3 
fe m .9 H -0 a 



248 



The New World 



New land 
laws 



As a step in the direction of land reforms, the National Assembly 
has already ordered the expropriation of all estates of more than 475 
acres if under cultivation and of 350 acres if uncultivated. Under 
this law the state will take 3,250,000 acres of cultivated land and 
7,500,000 acres of woodland, or enough for nearly 500,000 families. 
It will be a severe test of social and political strength to carry the 
process of land division to its logical end. In Bohemia, and especially 
in the southwestern part thereof and in the Bohemian portion of the 
valley of the Elbe, are many huge estates, some of which go back to 
the days of Czech expulsions after the battle of the White Moun- 
tain. The effect is to diminish the size of the farms elsewhere. The 
situation is even worse in Slovakia as a result of the Magyar regime. 
It was this condition that accounted in large part for the heavy emi- 
gration of earlier years. 

The following table gives the proportion of holdings in the three 
principal political divisions of Czecho-Slovakia that fall above or 
below a given size — three hectares or seven and a half acres : 



Countries 


Farms or 3 Hectares (7j Acres) 
OR Less 


Farms of More than 3 Hectares 
(7i Acres) 


Total Number 




Number 


Percentage of 
Arable Land 


Number 


Percentage of 
Arable Land 




Bohemia . . 
Moravia . . 
Silesia . . . 


580,073 

340,585 

42,805 


23.5 
29.6 

25.2 


1,890,405 
810,774 
126,979 


76.5 
70.4 
74.8 


2,470,478 

1,151,359 

169,784 


Total . . 


963,463 


25.4 


2,828,158 


74.6 


3,791,621 



A third of the peasant holdings of Bohemia range from fourteen 
to seventy acres. Many thousands of the farms have less than three 
acres. Some are as small as one acre apiece. In the expropria- 
tion of large estates small landholders, disabled soldiers, and legiona- 
ries^ and their dependents, will be given preference and will receive 
farms that range from fifteen to twenty-five to thirty-seven and a 
half acres, the size depending upon the value and quality of the soil. 
The best arable land will go to actual farmers ; municipahties, cor- 
porations, and scientific institutions may acquire non-arable allot- 
ments, such as forest lands, pasture lands, and ponds. 

^ The Czecho-Slovak troops who fought their way across Russia and Siberia in 1918- 
1919 (page 235). 



CHAPTER FOURTEEN 

JUGO-SLAVIAi AND THE ADRIATIC 

The Balkan countries — Serbia, Greece, Bulgaria, Rumania, Monte- 
negro, and Albania^ were long under the control of the Turkish 
Empire. By a series of wars against Turkey, in which at one time or 
another all of them participated, the Balkan countries gained first par- 
tial and at length complete independence. The next act in the his- 
toric drama of the freedom of the Balkans was played in the Balkan 
wars of 1912 and 1913. As a result of the two Balkan wars and the 
World War, the Balkan states now have an independent status, ^ un- 
fettered by either Turkish rule or the protection of the greater Euro- 
pean powers, save as to control of racial minorities (page 287) and 
freedom of transit across their territories. 

For our immediate purpose it is not necessary to trace the historical 
sequences of each country in detail, but only to point to those recent 
events and conditions that affect the present national life. A view 
of their so-called racial characters is especially helpful in understand- 
ing the new frontiers. 

The people of Serbia are Slavs, with slight linguistic differences be- Ethnic 
tween their language and that of the Bulgars. However, the latter composition 
were originally Finno-Ugrians of a later period of migration as con- 
trasted with the early invasions of the Slavs farther west. Mixture 
with the Slavs already established in the region and with those who 
came later has quite changed the original Bulgar stock. Slavic popu- 
lations also extend through Croatia and the eastern Adriatic region 
to the gates of Trieste. Northward, Slavic communities five beyond 
the Danube and the Save (Fig. 131). A broad belt of population of 
Slavic speech thus extends across the Balkans and includes the far- 
thest outposts of the Slavic world in Europe. 

In Rumania there is a distinct population neither Slav nor Ruman, 
but a mixture of the two, in which the Slav element predominates. 
In Greece there is a distinctive racial contrast to the Slavic belt of 
the middle Balkans ; but here also strong Slavic infusions have been 
introduced. 

Throughout the Balkans the Greek Orthodox Church represents The factor 
the prevailing religion, with a belt of Roman Catholic population in °^ religion 
northern Albania and in the centers of Italian culture on the Dal- 

^ The official title of the new state is " Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes." 
^ Except Montenegro, which is now included in Jugo-Slavia. 

249 



250 



The New World 




POPULATION DENSITY 



per sq. km 
Under 25 



persq mi. 
lUnder G4 



25 — SO E111g4 - 128 



«^«- Present boundaries Plebiscite areas 

Former „ Treaty of London 

line 

Y//////i Fig. 127. Population density and boundaries of Jugo-Slavia 

50 — 75 K%y^ 128 — 192 (Serb-Croat-Slovene Kingdom). Montenegro is now in- 

yc 100 ^^^ 192 ~ 25G eluded in the Jugo-Slav state. For the boundary with Italy 

inn 8^^? n^c ®®® Figure 138. The Klagenfurt plebiscite area has voted 

over 100 ^SBBa over Zbb ^^ g^ to Austria. Yrova. Schweizerischer Schul-atlas, sui>i>\e- 

mented by Pctermanns Mitteilungen, 1913. 



First 

Balkan 

War 



matian coast. Other exceptions to the predominance of the Greek 
Orthodox Church are : the central block of Moslem Albanians ; the 
Moslems (Croats chiefly) of Bosnia and Herzegovina ; the Moslems 
of Tlirace ; the Pomaks (Moslemized Bulgars and Turks) of Bulgaria ; 
and the Protestant and Catholic Saxons and Szeklers of Transylvania. 
The Balkan states threw off the last forms of Turkish control 
in 1912. They were encouraged to make their military effort of 
that year because the war between Italy and Turkey (1911-1912) 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 251 

had greatly weakened Turkey, who had exhibited herself as a 
power wholly incapable of holding in check the rising tide of 
nationalism in the Balkans. Montenegro declared war against Tur- 
key, and was supported by Bulgaria and Serbia, who had agreed 
before the war to a secret treaty establishing new frontiers should 
Turkey be defeated. Shortly after, Greece joined them and the four 
conducted an intensive campaign that drove Turkish forces out of the 
Balkans, except for a mere patch of territory near Constantinople and 
extending from that city to the Chatalja line of defenses (Fig. 207). 
Greek troops besieged and finally took Saloniki. The Serbian army 
defeated the Turkish army in Albania, and the Bulgarians captured 
Kirk Kihsse, Lule Burgas, and Adrianople. With these three regions 
in their hands, the Balkan aUies made peace with Turkey at Adri- 
anople in 1913, and then proceeded to divide amongst themselves 
the territory that they had liberated. 

In the process of establishing their mutual boundaries, the states Results of 
fell to quarreling. The outcome was the Second Balkan War, in 3*1^^^*^^^^ 
which Greece and Serbia, joined by Rumania, defeated Bulgaria. 
By the treaty of Bucarest (1913), Rumania obtained from Bulgaria 
a part of the Dobrudja containing 250,000 Bulgarians; Greece re- 
ceived Saloniki and a part of western Thrace ; and Serbia extended 
her southern boundary to meet the boundary of Greece, thus divid- 
ing Macedonia. By a subsequent treaty with Turkey, Bulgaria 
returned Kirk Kilisse, Lule Burgas, and Adrianople to Turkey. 

The general attack of the other Balkan countries upon Bulgaria in 
the Second Balkan War was responsible in part for the alliance of 
Bulgaria with the Central Powers in the war of 1914-1918. Defeated 
for a second time in the World War, Bulgaria underwent still further 
reduction of territory, as shown in Figures 151 and 153. 

To drive out the Turk was for years the common ambition of the ^j^^j^^ ^j 
Balkan states, but Serbia had a special aim, that of uniting to herself jugo-siavs. 
the Slavic groups outside her limits, to form a Jugo-Slav state ; for siavs 
Serbia included within her frontiers only a third of the total Jugo-Slav 
population. "Only ten years ago the Jugo-Slavs were living under six 
different governments ; and their deputies sat in fourteen different par- 
liaments, national or provincial. To attain their unity they have had 
to disrupt two such empires as Austria-Hungary and Turkey." 

In her struggle to effect the union of the Jugo-Slav groups, Serbia 
was opposed by Austria-Hungary, a far stronger power than Turkey. 
This opposition was due not merely to the fact that hundreds of 
thousands of Jugo-Slavs lived north of the Danube in old Austro- 



252 



The New World 



Conflict of 
Balkan and 
Germane- 
Austrian 
interests 



Resources 
and 

commerce 
of Balkan 
countries 




-. \ SOUTHERN HUNGARY 

^® V MOVEMENT OF THE POPULATION 

Scale of miles 

V 



^0' 




I 



THE CEOCR. REVIEW. Oct. 



->A Inward migration I ^erbs^ 
<-n Outward migration ^| ^Zlk^ 



Fig. 128. Compare with Figures 115, 123, and 146 to show effects of Magyar discrimination 

against subject minority peoples. 

Hungarian territory, but chiefly to the fact that the main mass of 
Jugo-Slavs hved in the provinces where Austria-Hungary had her 
only direct and unrestricted outlets to the sea ; that is, in Bosnia and 
Herzegovina (occupied by Austria-Hungary in 1878 and annexed to 
the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1908), in the Adriatic provinces, and 
about Trieste and Fiume. 

Behind Austria-Hungary stood a still stronger power, the German 
Empire. These two great empires, together comprising 115,000,000 
people, were not willing to foster Balkan nationalism at the expense 
of their own politiced scheme of creating a Central Europe under 
German domination. Their aim was not merely to invade and seize 
the Balkan lands or hmit the sovereignty of the Balkan peoples, 
for the Balkan lands are in general poor. Their object was more far- 
reaching : it was to use the Balkans as a passageway to the Turkish 
Empire ; to build the Bagdad road to the head of the Persian Gulf ; 
to win the subtropical products (chiefly raw materials) of Mesopo- 
tamia ; and, from the Persian Gulf, to invade the great trading marts 
of the Orient, principally those of India and China. 

We have referred to the low commercial rank of the Balkan coun- 
tries. The point wiU be clearer if we look at the outstanding economic 
features of the Balkan peninsula. 

The four largest Balkan countries in 1914 had a total trade (com- 
bining imports and exports) of $400,000,000, or less than 1 per cent 
of the world's total. Together they had a commercial importance 
that outranked that of Portugal or Norway and was less than that 
of Sweden, or Spain, or even Denmark. Of the total Balkan trade 
Rumania supphed half. 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic £5S 

Agricultural products are of chief importance in the export and 
import trade of the Balkans, forming three fourths of the whole. The 
industrially undeveloped state of the region is shown by the fact that 
products of the forest, the mine, and the factory form only from one 
fifth to one tenth of the total trade. They are composed chiefly of 
the lumber and petroleum of Rumania and the mineral ores of Greece. 

In more highly developed industrial countries with exports like 
those of the Balkans, the imports would include raw materials for 
manufacture. Not so in the Balkan countries. For example, the 
imports of raw cotton form only one third of one per cent of the total 
value of imports. Greece alone among the Balkan countries has a 
deficit of cereals and must import grain. Even sugar and coffee are 
imported in very small quantities ; the consumption of cofi'ee is less 
than one pound per person a year and of sugar eight pounds, or about 
one tenth the per capita amounts used in the United States. 

The exports of the Balkans went chiefly to the industrial districts and 
cities of central and northern Europe. Of Germany's total commerce 
with the principal Balkan states, 50 per cent by value was with 
Rumania. One half of the total imports of the Balkans came from 
Germany and Austria-Hungary. Measured by tonnage, 75 per cent 
of Germany's total Balkan trade was sea-borne, while 72 per cent 
of the trade with Austria was carried by rail. Of Germany's total 
commerce 8 per cent was river-borne, which indicates that Germany 
has as much interest in the physical improvement of the Danube and 
the commercial regulation of its trade as if she were a Balkan state. 

BOUNDARY DIFFICULTIES 

The new state of Jugo-Slavia consists of the former kingdom of Division of 
Serbia, to which are joined the former kingdom of Montenegro and population 
the districts of Bosnia, Herzegovina, Croatia, Dalmatia, Slavonia, a 
part of western Bulgaria, and part of the Banat of Temesvar. The 
total number of inhabitants is about 12,000,000, divided as follows : 
Serbs, 6,000,000; Croats, 2,500,000; Slovenes, 1,000,000; Mace- 
donian Slavs, 550,000 ; Magyars, 450,000 ; Albanians, 250,000 ; Mos- 
lem Serbs, 625,000 ; Rumanians, 150,000 ; Germans, 450,000 ; others, 
175,000. 

One of the most difiicult problems of southeastern Europe — and Difficult 
the most likely to lead to future war — is the boundary problem con- situation 
fronting the new state of Jugo-Slavia. Practically every mile of her siavil 
frontier, excepting only a portion bordering Greece, faces an unfriendly 
state. The danger springs from a number of complex causes, but is 



254 



The New World 




difficulties 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 9.55 

due chiefly to four, whose eff'ects must be closely watched in the 
future : 

(1) The peculiar distribution of the ethnic elements of the Slav 
state, whereby peninsulas of Slav population interlock with 
those of other nationalities in a way that makes it impos- 
sible to divide the territory without leaving both sides re- 
sentful. 

(2) The inclusion within Jugo-Slavia of blocks of territory in- 
habited almost exclusively by people who will constitute 
centers of irredentism in a politically weak state. 

(3) The occupation of Montenegro by Serbian troops. 

(4) The rivalry with Italy at Fiume and at Zara in Dalmatia, and 
with Italy and Albania at Lake Scutari, where a struggle may 
ensue for possession of the Drin outlet. 

The basis of each cause is worth thoughtful attention. 

(1) The northeastern boundary of Jugo-Slavia has been extended Bases of 
so far north of the Danube, especially in the region of the Banat of 
Temesvar (Fig. 142), that it includes numbers of Magyars and Saxons 
who are unwilling to be associated with the Jugo-Slav family and who 
will long favor a return of their land to Hungary, to which state they 
have belonged for a thousand years. 

(2) Equally serious is the annexation to Jugo-Slavia of the Tsari- 
brod, Bosilegrad, and Strumitsa districts (Fig. 153) inhabited by Bul- 
gars and taken from Bulgaria for strategic reasons. The three districts 

Fig. 129. This map (on the opposite page) should be freely consulted in the reading of the 
chapters relating to the different Balkan countries. The characteristics of the regions shown 
are briefly summarized as follows : 

1. Mediterranean climate and vegetation ; population restricted to small cultivable areas and 
pastures ; trading cities with maritime traditions. 

2. Some rain in summer, in contrast to 1 ; better access to interior ; a transition zone with 
respect to vegetation, climate, and population. 

3. Continental extremes of climate ; fertile loess soil, but wheat harvests apt to be affected by 
summer drought ; Balkan mountains on south, though easily crossed, a cultural boundary. 

4 and 4a. Mingling of Mediterranean and steppe characteristics ; diversified relief, climate, 

and agricultural resources. 
5. Elevated deforested country with small resoiirces. 
6 and 6a. Terraced plateau with abundant rain; modified central European type of climate; 

large maize and prune crops ; home of main body of Serbian population. 
7. Series of tectonic basins with fertile soil, graded river outlets, fine bordering pastures ; center 

of ancient Serbian state. 
8a and 8b. Cultivated basin floors ; winter pastures supporting herds of migratory shepherds ; 

climate and products reflecting ^gean influences. 
9. No unifying centers of life and culture, yet markedly uniform linguistic and ethnic char- 
acters ; absence of deep transverse valleys ; upland pastures separated by barren broken 

zone from low littoral belt with Mediterranean climate and products. 
10. Deep transverse valleys and high mountains bordered on seaward side by marshy coastal 

plain ; difficult relief reflected in tribal life and general backwardness of people, though the 

region is well endowed with natural resources. 



256 



The New World 




Fig. 130. The Rieka "Valley, a typical landscape view in Montenegro. 



approach rather closely to the main railway line leading from Belgrade 
and Nish southward through the Vardar-Morava trench to Saloniki, 
which is destined to be in time a great seaport and conomercial outlet 
for Serbia. 

(3) In addition to the difficulties on the east, due to the violation 
of the ethnic principle for reasons of strategy, there is added the Monte- 
negrin problem on the west. Montenegro joined Serbia in the war 
against the Central Powers ; but owing to a lack of public confidence 
in the king and his court (they left the country in 1916), a strong 
public sentiment developed in favor of union with Serbia, Croatia, 
and Slavonia to form a Jugo-Slav kingdom. It is natural that the 
officers of the old regime should wish to regain power, and that a 
separatist party should exist which will be a source of dissension and 
weakness for the newly created and experimental Jugo-Slav state. 
While Serbia has occupied Montenegro, the occupation was not ac- 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 257 

complished without violence and disorder, and this unfortunate cir- 
cumstance has diminished the faith of many of the Montenegrin 
people in the plan of union itself. There will long be a troublesome 
group of Montenegrins intriguing with the Albanians against the Jugo- 
slav government. 

A similar state of animosity exists on the Albanian frontier, where Troubles 
Serbs and Albanians are traditional enemies, the fu"st being Greek J?*® 
Orthodox, the latter — in part, at least — Moslem. A large number of 
Albanians live in the region of Prizren and Uskiib and desire union 
with Albania. On the other hand, Jugo-Slavia wishes to retain them 
and to absorb all of northern Albania, at least as far south as the Drin, 
in order to get a railway outlet by way of the Drin valley and at the 
same time protect her naval defenses at Cattaro and the Lake of 
Scutari. 

(4) Formerly Serbia was strugghng for a "window on the sea." 
At first she sought an outlet at Saloniki, but when this was lost to 
her by the Greek capture of that city in the First Balkan War, she 
sought an outlet on the Adriatic. The federation of all the southern 
Slavs offered her a long-delayed opportunity. Not merely a window, 
but the whole Dalmatian coast now became a chief territorial object, 
involving a prolonged diplomatic struggle with Italy which ended in 
1920 with the treaty of Rapallo (page 269). 

POLITICAL UNITY OF THE STATE 

Overshadowing all the difficulties enumerated above is the in- pact 
herent weakness of the entire plan of a Jugo-Slav state, viewed from °^ Corfu 
the standpoint of national unity. The strength of the idea behind 
a Jugo-Slav kingdom has yet to be proved. Croatia long and stead- 
fastly opposed the idea of Slav union, and thus played into the hands 
of Italy and Austria. Reconcifiation of Serbs and Croats was achieved 
only as late as 1903. Though an actual government was organized 
at Agram only after November 1918, the political foundations of the 
present Jugo-Slav state were laid in the pact of Corfu (July 1917). 
Representatives of Serbia and of the Jugo-Slav Committee of Lon- 
don met at Corfu and adopted, among others, the foUowing reso- 
lution: "The territory of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes will com- 
prise aU the territory where our nation lives in compact masses and 
without discontinuity, and where it could not be mutilated without 
injuring the vital interests of the community. It desires to free it- 
seK and establish its unity." 



258 



The New World 



The principal items of the pact of Corfu are as follows : 

(1) The Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes shall be a 
democratic, constitutional, and parliamentary monarchy under 
the Karageorgevichs, whose three co-national parts shall have 
a single allegiance. 

(2) The equality of the three chief religions within the new state 
— Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Mohammedan — shall be 
guaranteed. 

(3) The Latin and Cyrilhc alphabets shall both be used. 

(4) The territory of the new state shall be extended over all areas 
where Jugo-Slavs live in compact masses — which involves 
the union of Montenegro and Serbia. 

(5) The Adriatic Sea shall be kept free and open to all. 

(6) Elections shall be by universal, equal, direct, and secret vote. 

(7) A constitution shall be framed by a constituent assembly 
which shall serve as a basis for the life of the state. 



In spite of the pact of Corfu, the different parts of the state have 
not yet become amalgamated. Croatia has been in a separatist 
mood, due to the uncertainties arising from the Fiume situation 
and to the failure of the Jugo-Slav government to oust the Ital- 
ians, settle the foreign policy of the country, start railroad trains, 
supply coal, and defend the frontier against ItaUan aggression. 
The tendency toward disunion at one time (July 1919) reached 
a dangerous climax when an independent but short-lived Croatian 
republic was proclaimed, and conflict followed. If the separatist 
tendency should develop, the effects would be deplorable. The 
interests of all the peoples making up Jugo-Slavia are so closely re- 
lated and their neighbors are so formidable in size and strength that 
a strong confederated union, economic as well as political, is required 
if the state is to survive. 

Though all three main ethnic groups of Jugo-Slavia are Slavs in 
race, there are strong provincial differences of custom and speech be- 
tween the Slovenes, Croats, and Serbs. Some of the Slovenes and 
Croats — and their number is considerable — do not wish to have 
their capital at Belgrade, where, they feel sure, Serbian influences are 
bound to dominate the councils of the new nation. Finding them- 
selves placed athwart the highways leading out of the densely popu- 
lated hinterland of central Europe, the two northern elements (Slo- 
venes and Croats) see many advantages in independence. As the 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 259 

boundaries now stand, Serbia would be practically compelled to find 
her outlet to the Adriatic through the northern provinces. 

Related to the separatist problem is uncertainty as to the outcome struggle 
of the long struggle which Jugo-Slavia has made, and through which ^^^ation 
it has not yet passed, to decide whether its govermnent shall be strongly 
centrahzed or whether there shall be a high degree of local autonomy. 
In the pact of Corfu, as we have seen, a strongly centralized govern- 
ment was proclaimed, and this was reaffirmed by the Act of Union 
(1918), when the Prince Regent proclaimed the "Kingdom of the 
Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes." At that time the Croatian national 
assembly voted for the union. Later, in 1919, there was a sharp 
struggle, owing to the inability of the various political parties to 
agree on a cabinet which the national assembly could support. 

The new country has had to depend for a long time upon a pro- 
visional government, and until a convention is held and the final 
form of government determined, it is not desirable that the provisional 
government should go too far in either direction ; that is, either 
toward centralization or toward local autonomy of the people of the 
different regions. All parties in Jugo-Slavia outside of old Serbia 
are opposed to the dominance of Serbia in Jugo-Slav affairs. To add 
to the difficulties, schools and newspapers are few, illiteracy is high, 
and the people have for the most part a warhke disposition. 

Having passed in review some of the outstanding current prob- Difficulties 
lems of Jugo-Slavia, we shall now return to each principal item and ^^ political 

. . . . . orgamza- 

discuss it in greater detail in connection with the maps. Figures 131 to tion 
142, before passing to the study of the economic strength of the new 
state and the character of its people. 

mVAL TERRITORIAL CLAIMS 

The Eastern Adriatic — Jugo-Slav or Italian 

The most serious zone of friction is the Istrian peninsula, Dalmatia, ^he istrian 
and the uplands of Carniola bordering Italy. It is of prime impor- p^°5^®™ 
tance to establish the facts, not merely in relation to a problem that 
was long prominent, but for the understanding of future boundary 
disputes that any present settlement will be unable to prevent. 

Let us begin with an examination of the map which shows the 
ethnic distribution of Jugo-Slavs and Italians (Fig. 131). The Slavs 
are indisputably predominant up to and beyond the Isonzo. Trieste 
is, so to speak, an Italian island in a Jugo-Slav sea, and by far the 
greater part of the population of Istria itself is Jugo-Slav (Fig. 132). 



area 



260 



The New World 




Former boundaries __.__Plebiscite areas Treaty of London line 



Fig. 131. Ethnic elements on the boundary of Jugo-Slavia, 
including the line of the treaty of London of 1915. From 
British General Staff ethnic map, 1: 1,500,000, 1918. Key 
to numerals: 1, Jugo-Slavs; 2, Italians; 3, Germans; 4, Czecho- 
slovaks ; 5, Magyars ; 6, Rumanians ; 7, Bulgarians ; 8, Al- 
banians; 9, Macedonians; 10, Greeks; ll.Vlachs; 12, Turks. 

But the term "Jugo-Slav" includes Croats 
and Slovenes as well as Serbs, and while 
Serbia fought most gallantly in the World 
War on the side of the Allies, many Croats 
and practically all the Slovenes fought with 
equal tenacity on the side of the Central Powers. Italian armies faced 
Slovene and Croat divisions for more than three years. Yet when 
the Austro-Hungarian Empire fell apart and a Jugo-Slav kingdom was 
created, Slovenes and Croats who had been fighting against the Allies 
were suddenly thrown by a mere political phrase — "the Kingdom of 
the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes" — into the ranks of the Allies. 



Key to Fig. 131. 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 261 

By way of further explanation of Italy's attitude, it may be stated itaUan 
that Italian armies proved a big factor in the winning of the war, ^4?^)^** 
during which Italy suffered heavy loss, including at least 475,000 compen- 
men killed — many of them at the hands of Slovene soldiers. Her material 
northeastern provinces were devastated. ^^^^^ 

It would be easy to make out an equally good case for Serbia, which 
suffered even more cruelly from the war ; but the argument cannot 
be applied to the whole of Jugo-Slavia. And, as we have seen, this is 
but one of the differences between the parts of the Jugo-Slav state? 
all of which make its continued existence uncertain, its boundaries? 
therefore, to a certain extent hypothetical. The integrity of the 
state depends upon its internal unity as well as upon external agree- 
ments with neighboring states. The forces of disunion in Jugo-Slavia 
are stronger than in any other newly created state of central Europe. 

When we contrast these two sets of considerations, — the service 
of Italy to the Allies and the weakness of the Jugo-Slav state, — we 
see that the principle of drawing boundary lines on an ethnic basis 
is one that at times must be modified in favor of other factors. 

Italy is a narrow peninsula with an extremely long and vulnerable 
seacoast. Added to dread of the overwhelming strength of a historic 
enemy on the northeast — the old empire of Austria-Hungary — was 
the fear of possible attack from the eastern Adriatic shore. 

Faced by these historic conditions and the relative strength and 
importance of the Italian and Jugo-Slav states, the Jugo-Slavs them- 
selves did not deny the right of the Italians to enjoy naval supremacy 
on the Adriatic. That Trieste should be in Italian possession and that 
Pola should be a great Italian naval base, were points conceded by 
every student of the problem. 

Up to this point we have been dealing with matters about which 
there has been little, if any, serious dispute. We now enter the realm 
of controversial facts and conclusions. 

The Italians claimed the Dalmatian coast on the ground that the ^he fringe 
culture of the whole eastern fringe of the Adriatic is Italian. It is ofitaUan 

cultxire 

true that Italians predominate : 

(1) In the narrow western fringe of Istria. 

(2) In the towns of Fiume (not including Susak) and Zara. 

(3) In the islands of Lussin and Unie. 

But it is true also that the Italians scattered along the eastern Adriatic 
littoral are city and not country dwellers, traders and not farmers. 
They cannot be said to occupy the region. A like criticism may 



262 



The New World 



Relations 
of culture 
and ethnog- 
raphy 




oMatferia 
Pisano /^"^N 

O Xv s^ \^ 



be made of the cultural 
argument. The evi- 
dences of Italian culture 
in the towns belong to 
past importations and 
give no basis for true 
regional development. 

The extent of ItaHan 
cultural influence is 
greater than the area 
in which Italians live. 
Italy was historically 
and culturally far ad- 
vanced when, behind 
the coastal fringe, the 
uplands of Jugo-Slavia 
were a primeval wilder- 
ness. 

Cultural considera- 
tions here form a pecul- 
iarly weak basis for 
national claims, because 
the ties of race, lan- 
guage, and political 
faith are stronger than 
the ties of culture, even 
though that culture be 
long established. The 
people are Jugo-Slavs 
and wished to remain Jugo-Slavs, and they did not wish to accept 
ItaHan sovereignty merely because from early times the coast of the 
region, formerly known as Illyria, had attracted Roman warriors and 
ship builders, traders, travelers, and priests. The Jugo-Slavs asked : 
"How many thousands of Jugo-Slavs are you going to claim because 
the architecture is Italian, and because the Romans hundreds of years 
ago cut timber on our coast, sent missionaries, raised large buildings, 
and traded with our people .»^" 

The difficulties of the dispute between Italy and Jugo-Slavia arose 
in large part because the ethnic, cultural, and military Hnes do not 
coincide. It is hard to select a line that gives equal attention to these 
three considerations. If the best military line be selected, the ethnic 




10 IS 20 2SH 




Boundary of 1914 __Treaty of London Line —.—Italian claim 1919 

...Italian claim, Apr 8,1915 ^._._Line of occupation __x— Wilson line' 

Austrian offer; May 10,1915 after armistice ^^^ Italians 

t^^^^ Free state of Flume as proposed in 1919 



Fig. 132. Ethnographic and boundary map of Istria. Eth- 
nography after the Austrian census of 1910. For detailed map 
of Fiume see Figures 133 and 139. There are valuable mer- 
cury mines at Idria, now acquired by Italy. 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 263 

principle is violated ; if a cultural line be followed, military and naval 
considerations are set aside. 

The geographic argument was often invoked for the union of eastern The two 
Adriatic lands with Italy. The climate and vegetation are "Med- ^ides of the 

?? Ti 1 r» 1 1 Adnatic 

iterranean, like those of the Italian eastern coast, but so also like geograpw- 
the coast of Greece. The physiography, wholly unlike that of eastern ^^^^ ^^^^ 
Italy, is a unit with that of western Serbia. The commercial relations 
have been Italian, and the people have always had a seafaring element, 
and so much at least depends upon geographical situation. As for 
similarity of geographical factors supporting the idea of pohtical unity, 
this argument is at best a broken reed upon which to lean, wherever 
it is applied. The stage of civilization counts for much. What is 
geographically feasible and even advantageous in a modern state 
may have been impracticable in the period of Venetian power. The 
measure of obstruction which the Dinaric Alps and the Karst offer 
to the people east of them is not to be taken in hundreds of feet of 
elevation. The burden of transportation costs over the coastal 
mountains falls upon a vastly greater population today than in the 
days when the Italian frontier followed an interior hue ; and the per 
capita share is proportionately smaller. Finally, geographical unity 
involves the matter of scale and relationship. The unity of Venetian 
lands is a smaller and a more locaUzed matter than the unity of Jugo- 
slavia. The Appalachians were once a serious barrier, and their 
influence is still felt ; but they hardly impair the unity of the United 
States. 

A situation so complicated as this is could hardly have been settled secret 
to the satisfaction of both sides under the most favorable conditions. V^^^I °* 

. London, 

But confusion, misunderstanding, and the causes of endless disputes 1915 
and iU feeling were increased by the secret treaty of London, signed 
in 1915, between Great Britain, France, Russia, and Italy, under 
the terms of which Italy agreed to enter the war. By this treaty 
Italy was to receive : 

(1) The Austrian Tyrol, to the Brenner Pass (Fig. 70). 

(2) All of Goritzia, Gradisca, and Istria, and the city of Trieste 
(but not Fiume). , 

(3) Dalmatia to Capa Blanca, with practically all the Dalmatian 
islands (Fig. 138). 

(4) Valona,^ in Albania, with the surrounding region (Fig. 155). 

(5) The Dodecanese and a zone on the Turkish mainland, to be 
defined later (see Fig. 158). 

^ Known also as Avlona and Vlore. 



264 



The New World 



(6) The right to claim compensation in Africa, in case France and 
Great Britain should secure increases of territory on that 
continent. 

According to the treaty of London, Italy was to get not only Trieste, 
but Istria, Goritzia, and Dalmatia as well, and in all those districts 
the proportion of ItaHans was less than of Jugo-Slavs, save along the 
western margin of Istria. On the other hand, in Dalmatia, out of a 
total population of 635,000 there were only 18,000 Italians as opposed 
to 611 000 Slavs Of the 18,000 Itahans, 11,768 were in the district 
of Zara and 2357 in the district of Spalato, every other Dalmatian 
town having less — generally much less — than 1000 Italians. 

It would have been easy for everybody to accept the terms of the 
treaty of London had the Austro-Hungarian Empire hung together. 
Instead it broke up into its ethnic divisions, one of which was Carniola, 
the country of the Slovenes. This district was joined (by decision of 
the Peace Conference of Paris) to Serbia and Croatia to form Jugo- 
slavia. As a result, when Italy sought to annex the territory, she 
found herself dealing not with an enemy (Austria-Hungary), but 
with an ally (Serbia). 

The city of Fiume is the chief focus of difficulty. Counting the 
suburb of Susak, the city has a Slav majority (26,600 Jugo-Slavs to 




Fig. 133. The organized character of the port is in contrast to the backward state of ports on 
the Dalmatian coast. Note that Susak, a suburb on the east side of a small stream, is an integral 
part of the city of Fiume. From United States Hydrographic Office chart, No. 4072.(1915). 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 



265 




Zonal limits of 
trade influence — 



Present boundaries Former boundaries 



25,800 Italians) ; but 
the Italians are in a 
slight majority if this 
suburb is not included. 
Many persons talk 
loosely of Susak as if 
it were another city 
separated from Fiume 
by a river. As a mat- 
ter of fact, only a shal- 
low brook separates 
the two ; Susak is as 
much a part of Fiume 
as Brooklyn is a part 
of New York. The 
country around Fiume 
is solidly Jugo-Slav. 

In the hands of the 
Jugo-Slavs the trade of 
Fiume would grow, and 
the town would become 
a rival of the port 
of Trieste. The argu- 
ment advanced by the Jugo-Slavs is that if both ports are in the hands Rivalry 
of the Itahans, Trieste will be higlily developed by them and Fiume 
left to stagnate. Fiume and Trieste are the natural outlets for a Fiume 
large commerce that is bound to be far more important in the future. 
Figures 134 and 135 show the relation of these two towns to the trade 
of the hinterland. As shown by the railroad map (Fig. 135), to take 
Fiume from Jugo-Slavia is to take away the focus of her northern 
railways, the one Adriatic port easily accessible to Jugo-Slavia and 
capable of high development, the natural center of a Jugo-Slav region, 
a possible commercial capital. 

Figures 127, 129, and 135 together exhibit the relation of the dis- 
tribution of people and raihoads to the outlines of the country and 
to the seaboard. Most of the people of the new state live in interior 
valleys shut off from the sea by a broad belt of mountain ridges par- 
allel to the coast. These ridges are difficult to cross ; only two tortu- 
ous narrow-gauge railways traverse them. 

It might be supposed from Figure 129 that the five hundred miles of 
deeply indented and island-bordered coastline of the eastern Adriatic 



Fig. 134. 



The field of trade rivalry between Trieste and Fiume. 
From Meereskunde, Vol. 5, 1911. 



between 
Trieste and 



266 



Tlie New World 



Small 
harbors of 
the eastern 
Adriatic 
coast 



Jugo-Slavs 
and Italians 
in Dalmatia 




would furnish the new 
state with adequate 
harbors, even with 
Fiume lost to it. But 
this is not the case. 
The harbors are small 
and they are not capable 
of economical improve- 
ment. The mountains 
stand knee-deep in the 
sea, with so httle flat 
land along the shore 
for the development of 
towns, and such steep 
descents from the up- 
lands behind the towns, 
that port works on a 
large scale are almost 
prohibitive. Another 
disadvantage of the 
coast is the "bora," a 
cold and treacherous 
north wind that descends swiftly from the uplands and is exceed- 
ingly dangerous for ships in narrow passages and in deep water where 
anchorage is difficult. 

Buccari is surrounded by steep cliffs and has a dangerous entrance ; 
Porto Re is too small ; Zengg is at the base of lofty cliffs and is noted 
for the fury of the bora from October to March; Spalato and Se- 
benico have good harborage, but they are separated from the interior 
by lofty mountains, and their narrow-guage railway is closed by snow 
nearly every winter for two or three weeks ; Cattaro and Zara have 
no railroad; Metkovic, Gravosa, Ragusa, and Castelnuovo have a 
narrow-gauge railway connection with the interior, but the service 
is costly and uncertain. 

The whole Dalmatian coast is almost exclusively Jugo-Slav. With- 
in the treaty of London line as drawn for Dalmatia, there are more 
than 600,000 Jugo-Slavs and only 18,000 Italians. In two coast 
ports, Zara and Sebenico, the Italian element rises to higher pro- 
portions than elsewhere, and Zara, like Fiume, has been made a free 
port as a compromise. 

The Jugo-Slavs assert that the justice of their claim to Dalmatia is 



Fig. 135. Fiume, Trieste, and SalonikI are the chief ports of 
the Jugo-Slav region as of 1914. The Dalmatian coast is 
difficult of access, and the completion of the projected Drin- 
Scutari outlet would involve Jugo-Slavia in international quar- 
rels with Albania and possibly with Italy. From Railways of 
J ugo-Slao countries, 1 : 2,300,000, Paris (i919?). 



Jugoslavia and the Adriati 



ic 



mi 




268 



The New World 



Plebis 
cite in 
Dalmatia 



Fiume and 
the Italian 
program 




further supported by the re- 
sults of the plebiscite taken 
(1919) in aU the communes 
occupied by ItaUan troops. 
More than three hundred and 
fifty towns participated in the 
elections, and the result was a 
vote of 96 per cent in favor of 
union with Jugo-Slavia. The 
nine islands aU gave majorities 
above 95 per cent for union. 
Except for Zara, there is no 
town with an Itahan majority 

!FiQ. 137. Centers of Italian culture in Dalmatia. • pi 1 f* i +V. 

The broken line represents Ihe line of the treaty of ^^ Uaunatia, aUQ UOUC OtUCr 

London, 1915. However, Spalato and Zara are the "with morC than 10 DCr CCUt of 

only cities, which have an Italian population in ex- y , , , . 

cess of 1000. Irom Giotto Dainelli, La Dalmazia, ItahaU population. 

^^'^' ^"P '^- Some of the islands, notably 

Lagosta, depend entirely upon their trade with the Jugo-Slav coast. 
•Fishing and grape culture are their two principal industries, and their 
products are abundant in Italy and needed in Jugo-Slavia. In some 
instances the people of the islands asserted that to give them to Italy 
would be to destroy their economic life. 

The agreement embodied in the treaty of London, to give Italy 
large territorial grants, handicapped France and Great Britain at the 
Peace Conference of Paris. Fiume, especially, had been excluded 
from the treaty of London agreement; this new desire was in re- 
sponse to the demands of pohtical opponents of the Italian govern- 
ment, who forced Orlando and Sonnino, the chief Itahan representa- 
tives, to adopt the most extreme imperiahstic claims. 

To make matters worse, when the armistice was signed in November 
1918, between the AlHes and Austria-Hungary, Italy was assigned 
the military occupation of the country between the London Kne 
and the sea; and she therefore came to the peace conference with 
the expressed hope that the terms of her secret treaty with France and 
Great Britain would be the basis on which her eastern frontier would 
be fixed. 

France and Great Britain were willing to put into effect the treaty 
of London, since they regarded it as a solemn engagement. They 
could not concede anything more. Then came D'Annunzio to thrust 
himself into an already over-complicated situation. With several 
contingents of Italian troops he occupied Fiume in violation of the 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 



269 



solemn pledge of Italy, 
in the armistice of 4 No- 
vember 1918, whereby 
she was to keep only a 
handful of troops in 
Fiume as part of her 
obligation to maintain 
order in the former 
Austro-Hungarian Em- 
pire as far as the treaty 
of London line. 

The Itahan govern- 
ment felt that it could 
not send ItaHans to kill 
Itahans, and therefore 
made no serious at- 
tempt to dislodge D'An- 
nunzio. Before his ul- 
timate surrender late in 
1920 he was able to defy 
the Itahan and Jugo- 
slav governments, to 
raid Zara, to estabHsh a 
postal service, to print 
money, and to attempt 
to organize an inde- 
pendent city state. 

The boundary be- 
tween Italy and Jugo- 
Slavia was settled in 
November 1920 by the 
treaty of Rapallo (Figs. 
138 and 139). By the terms of the treaty Italy secured the impor- Treaty of 
tant railway junction of Tarvis, a part of Carniola, and all of Istria R^p^"" 
as well as the adjacent islands of Cherso, Lussin, and l^nie, and 
obtained for Fiume the status of a free city with direct territorial 
connection with Italy. She obtained also the Pelagosa Islands in the 
mid-Adriatic and the island of Lagosta at the southern end of the 
Dalmatian chain. Zara (Fig. 131), including part of the hinterland, 
was made a free city. Jugo-Slavia secured all the remaining islands 
along the eastern Adriatic. 




Fig. 138. Final settlement of the territorial dispute in the 
region at the head of the Adriatic. The shaded portion of the 
map represents the territory gained by Italy in excess of that 
pledged to her by the secret treaty of London, 1915. See 
Figure 139 for details in the Fiume region. 



270 



The New World 



^ G 0\-S Lav 




Fig. 139. New boundaries "in the Fiume region according to the treaty of Rapallo, between 
Italy and Jugo-Slavia. The broken line at Lenci is part of the boundary of the "corpus sepa- 
ratum," and the remaining part is the solid line northward and eastward terminating on the 
coast between Fiume and its suburb, Susak. From Lenci westward to Rubesi is the "strip" 
added to the Free State of Fiume to provide direct territorial connection between Fiume and Italy. 
The area of the Free State of Fiume is 11 square miles, and its population is 53,000. Spellings 
follow the 1 : 75,000 Austrian General Staff sheet. 

Jugo-Slavia's fleet will long be small, and her hold upon the sea 
feeble. Only a few naval bases are available to serve as rendezvous 
for the armed ships needed for the control of the fishing industry, 
the supervision of the customs arrangements, and the protection of 
the ports. It had been the policy of the Allies to make Italy not 
merely strong, but in every respect predominant in the Adriatic; 
for her posilion on a slender peninsula, with a coastline mpossibly 
long to defend by land, puts the burden of national security upon the 
Italian fleet To have two equally strong navies on opposite sides of 
the narrow Adriatic Sea was deemed unwise. Italy's long-deferred 
hope to secure complete control of the Adriatic is now realized. 

The Scutari Region 
Wliile there are scores of problem areas in the world and scores of 
points of friction between neighboring states, a few of them are of 
quite special unportance because of the unsettled nature of the ques- 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 



271 



tions they present, and also because 
they he in situations that offer every 
inducement for a quarrel. Among such 
the Scutari region is one of the most 
outstanding. It will be difficult to pre- 
vent Italy and Jugo-Slavia or Albania 
and Jugo-Slavia from becoming in- 
volved in actual war because of the 
complicated geographic and economic 
conditions that have their focus : 

(1) On the lake and in the town of 
Scutari. 

(2) In the Drin valley, which crosses 
northern Albania. 

(3) At the Boyana River, which is the 
outlet of the Drin-Scutari basin. 




Rival 
claims of 
Jugo- 
slavia and 
Albania 
about Lake 
Scutari 



Fig. 140. The broken line shows the 
position of the new international bound- 
ary between Italy and Jugo-Slavia at 
the southern end of the Dalmatian Is- 
lands, according to the treaty of Rapallo, 
November 1920. Lagosta and the adja- 
cent islets as well as Pelagosa are added 
to Italy. The land mass at the upper 
right-hand corner is a part of Dalmatia; 
that in the lower left-hand corner is a part 
of Italy. The width of the Adriatic is 
here only about 00 miles. 



(4) At the large port of Cattaro, which is the only port that by 
present arrangements can become a Jugo-Slav naval base. 



It is worth one's while to 
make a close study of Figure 
141, which shows the critical 
relations of the region. The 
Serbs would like to have actual 
possession of the Drin valley, 
for it is the natural main out- 
let of aU that portion of Serbia 
from Nish to the Greek frontier 
in Macedonia. They would 
like also to have the Boyana 
River, which is the outlet of 
all the country centering on 
Lake Scutari, a country with 
rich trade possibilities and of 
great importance to Jugo- 
Slavia in the protection of 
her mountainous southwestern 
frontier. 

Jugo-Slavia is eager to lose 
no trade advantage, and the 
northern Albanian tribes have 



! israo' 




Fig. 141. Drainage relations in the Scutari region. 
The broken line is the boundary between Albania and 
Montenegro, now part of Jugo-Slavia. Both Albania 
and Jugo-Slavia wish to control the Drin Valley and 
Lake Scutari. Note the two outlets of the Drin and 
the connection of the Boyana with Lake Scutari- 



272 



The New World 





Key to Fig. 142. 



Fig. 142. The complex ethnography of the Banat and the Backa dis- 
tricts, according to Cvijic, Carte ethnographique des regions septentrionaies 
Yougoslaves, 1 : 1,000,000, 1919. 

a considerable trade, which Italy wishes to control. 
Thus the through trade of Jugo-Slavia, from the 
southern part of old Serbia to the sea, the local trade 
of the Albanian tribesmen and the Montenegrins, the defenses of 
Cattaro, — all have combined to develop trade rivalries, territorial 
rivalries, and political rivalries of the sharpest kind, which, if uncon- 
trolled by the good services of the League of Nations or the larger 
powers, will surely lead to war. 

The Western Banat 

A part of the Banat of Temesvar has had a close connection with 
several of Jugo-Slavia's most pressing difficulties. One of these 
is the location of the future national capital. The Serbs natu- 
rally wish the capital to be Belgrade ; but if that city is chosen, 
Serbian influences \vill greatly predominate in the government. 
Moreover, Belgrade lies near the margin of the country and with 
the Danube as a boundary would be open to attack from the north, 
where there is no effective military barrier. That is one reason (as 
well as deficiency of cereals in Serbia) why the Serbs carried on a 
diplomatic fight ifor the rich farming country of the Banat. They 
secured, not the whole district, but the western third, and this with 



Jugoslavia and the Adriatic 273 

a part of the Backa, north of the Danube, gives them a bridgehead 
of great defensive value. 

In the Banat, Serbia has a serious difference of opinion with Ru- 
mania. The peasants of Temesvar wished to join the Serbs ; the 
landowners wished to join Rumania. This disagreement was a 
natural consequence of the general policy of the Rumanian govern- 
ment, which has long favored the large landowners, although division 
of the large landed estates has been compelled at times by revolting 
peasants or by special pohtical conditions. 

Both Jugo-Slavia and Rumania regard the Banat as vital to their Serbian 
future, not only from the standpoint of defense, but also from the BaMt^of*^* 
standpoint of agricultural production. Jugo-Slavia lacks cereals ; she Temesvar 
does not produce enough food for her own people and must therefore 
import grain. The rich grain fields of the Banat would be a boon to 
her. The shepherds of the hill country (wliich is of large extent), the 
dwellers in the towns, the workers in the mines and factories, the 
fishermen on the coast, — all have need of other foodstuffs than those 
they produce, and the Banat, with the Backa, is one of the most 
important sources of surplus food for the supply of the Balkans. 

Unfortunately, it is hard to make a fair decision in a regioji whose 
population is so thorouglily mixed as that of the Banat (Fig. 142). In 
any case there would have been serious difficulties; but the diffi- 
culties were greatly increased by the heavy requisitions made by the 
Serbs in the Banat, especially during the latter part of the period of 
their military occupation (1919). 

Since the drainage of the Banat in general runs across the boundary 
line between Jugo-Slavia and Rumania, some agreement will have to 
be made whereby the two states shall cooperate in the maintenance 
and development of the canals, waterways, and railways, for the 
mutual benefit of their people (page 290). 

INTERNAL COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL PROBLEMS 

^ We turn now to the domestic and internal problems of the new state, jugo- 
The resources of Jugo-Slavia are poorly balanced. Like Italy, she eJonoi^-* 
will have to depend upon northern Europe for coal. Her northern caiiyseif- 
half, like Hungary, will have an excess of food supply over consump- 
tion. Like Albania, her southern half will be difficult to govern; 
for here live turbulent mountain elements, including Albanians, 
Greeks, and Mohammedans. The Danube offers a means for local 
commerce ; but for export other than to Bulgaria and Rumania the 
Danube outlet is too roundabout. It strengthens the capital to 



274 



The New World 



Lack of 
coal 



Com- 
mercial 
treaties 
with her 
neighbors 



Land laws 
in Bosnia 
and Herze- 
govina 



have all the drainage run toward it; but the economic Hfe of the 
whole country would be better served if the streams ran toward the 
Adriatic instead of away from it. 

Jugo-Slavia is poor in coal ; the only mines of commercial impor- 
tance are in Serbia and Bosnia. She formerly used about 300,000 
tons a month, of which she produced about 270,000 tons, making up 
the deficit from Great Britain, Austria, and Germany. In the retreat 
of the enemy armies in 1918, the Serbian coal mines were largely 
dynamited and flooded, and production was all but stopped. Austria 
has to import most of her coal ; Germany must export to France and 
Italy by the terms of the treaty of Versailles ; Great Britain's export 
coal will be sent to her own colonies, to South America, to France, and 
to Italy. Serbia's neighbors have no coal to send her. Moreover, 
Jugo-Slavia is a region cold in winter. Its prevailing winter winds 
are from the north, and much of its surface consists of mountain 
upland, where coal or wood is a necessity. To complicate the situa- 
tion, few of the raihoads can deliver fuel ; they cannot properly take' 
care of even the products of the farms. 

The new Serb-Croat-Slovene state (Jugo-Slavia) will not be able 
to mine 3,000,000 tons of coal a year. Of other commercial minerals, 
Jugo-Slavia has important deposits of manganese and iron. Slavonia 
has lead mines capable of further development. Within the new 
frontiers there are extensive forests and water-power resources ; but 
neither of these can be utilized effectively without an extension of 
the present railway network. 

In startmg her commercial life, Jugo-Slavia has found it necessary 
to make commercial treaties with her neighbors, each party to the 
treaty improving its condition by marketing abroad its surplus and 
importing the complementary products of its neighbor. Commercial 
relations are already developing between Jugo-Slavia and Poland. 
The former sends meat, fat, tobacco, prunes, and distilled liquor to 
Poland, and Poland sends in return petroleum, salt, sugar, and manu- 
factured goods. Jugo-Slavia also benefits from the conditions of a 
treaty with Austria which favors her transit traffic, and from a treaty 
with Czecho-Slovakia by which Jugo-Slavia receives large quantities 
of sugar in exchange for grain and cattle. Jugo-Slavia is attempting 
to exchange merchandise with Russia through the Pan-Russian Central 
Union of Cooperative Societies. 

Like aU the other new states of central Europe, Jugo-Slavia has its 
share of land problems, owing to the dissatisfaction and poverty of 
the peasantry, who suffered terribly in the war. In Herzegovina the 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 275 

farm holdings as a rule are uniformly small, while in Bosnia a large 
part of the land is held in common by villages or is in the hands of 
landowners of moderate means who own several farms apiece. The 
new land laws of Jugo-Slavia have thrown this system into confusion 
by distributing the lands among many landless peasants, thereby 
creating a great deal of discontent among former owners as well as 
among dissatisfied peasants who want still larger holdings. As a 
result of general discontent, the farmers of Bosnia and Herzegovina 
have sought to form a separate political party for the protection of 
their rights, and opinion is tending in the same direction in Serbia. A 
first conference of farmer-peasants was held at Yelika Plana in 
October 1919. 

In that portion of former Austria-Hungary now included in Jugo- 
Slavia, about 35,000 acres of land have been divided among the 
peasants. 

Every new state first organizes a government, and directly there- Loan of 
after seeks to borrow money abroad with which to pay expenses and JJg'^new" 
start imports of food and raw materials. When industrial life has states often 

. 1 a ^ • ??• -ii^ political 

begun, commerce revives, and government machmery is provided, matter 
then taxes can be collected. But at first loans are vital to national 
existence. Confronted by this necessity, Jugo-Slavia finds that, like 
a number of other weak states, she can borrow money only under 
conditions that make the loans a factor in international politics. 
There seems to be no easy way to avoid this curtailment of freedom 
of action ; for if a nation is unable to obtain its funds among its own 
people, it must appeal to its neighbors for help, and it is to be ex- 
pected that help will be given only with undesirable stipulations. 



THE TREATMENT OF MINORITY POPULATIONS 

Like the other Balkan states, and also Poland and Czecho-Slovakia, Minorities 
Jugo-Slavia was required by the Peace Conference of Paris to sign a ^^^^^^ 
separate minorities treaty with the Allies which guarantees certain 
rights to alien peoples living within the boundaries of the state. It 
was the thought of the Allied powers that the signing of these treaties 
would help to establish full liberty of speech, press, and religion, and 
that one of the causes of war would thus be removed. 

The minorities treaties are alike in all essentials. They differ from char- 
state to state only in that special provisions are made for special of*4"se*^^ 
cases. Since Poland has many Jews and the others a relatively treaties 
small number, special provisions were made for the Jews in Poland. 



276 



The New World 



In Jugo-Slavia special provisions were made for the Moslems (who 
may have a head of the church within the state), and for the special 
protection of cemeteries and religious establishments. 

The minorities treaties remove all restrictions upon the use of 
languages, upon the exercise of any religion not injurious to public 
morals, and upon the press, public meetings, etc. All languages are 
to be given adequate facilities before the courts. All racial, linguistic, 
and religious minorities shall have the right to establish, manage, 
and control at their own expense charitable, religious, and social in- 
stitutions, schools, etc. The national government may make the 
official language obligatory in all the schools, if it provides adequate 
facilities for other languages used by the people within its frontiers. 

The minorities treaties also provide for the equitable treatment 
of the commerce of the Allied and Associated Powers within the states 
signing the treaties; and the central European states who have 
signed the treaties must give to the conunerce of the Allied and Asso- 
ciated Powers, during the succeeding five years, at least as favorable 
treatment as they may accord to the commerce of those states with 
whom the Allied and Associated Powers have recently been at war. 
Vessels of commerce are to have equality of treatment, except for 
special provisions affecting coasting traffic, as on the Adriatic coast 
of Jugo-Slavia, the Baltic coast of Poland, and the Black Sea coast 
of Rumania. 

The treaties also provide for the freedom of transit of persons, 
goods, carriages, wagons, and mails over the territory of the sig- 
natory poAvers, and for the freedom of transit of postal, telegraphic, 
and telephonic messages. 

THE SPECIAL CASE OF SERBIA 

Partly because Serbia is the largest of the political units of Jugo- 
Slavia and partly because it formed the nucleus of the new state, 
special mention must be made of its particular problems. 

The Serbian army was one of the first to feel the shock of war in 
1914. After a brave defense of Belgrade it was overcome, and there- 
upon began its famous retreat across Albania, in the winter of 1915. 
The casualties were enormous, not only among the army but also 
among the half-million civilians who attempted to follow the same 
route. It is estimated that 10 per cent of the men died of famine and 
fatigue. 

From the end of 1915 until the armistice of 1918, Serbia was oc- 
cupied by Austrian and Bulgarian armies, which had as their declared 



Jugo-Slavia and the Adriatic 277 

object the extermination of the Serbian people. They stopped import Attempted 
of food to the starving population, drafted the young men into their tton™the 
armies, assassinated priests and teachers, abolished Serbian customs, Serbian 
closed schools and churches, and in some districts destroyed the entire ^^°^ ^ 
population or drove it into the forests and mountains. 

The total population of 4,500,000 was reduced by these means by 
more than 1,300,000. In the army the killed and missing numbered 
690,000 ; the civihan dead numbered 640,000. Of the total popula- 
tion, 30 per cent had been killed by the end of 1918. 

To restore such a country to national life and happiness is a task of 
incalculable difficulty. The sources of revenue have been dried up, 
the country is devastated, the herds and flocks are largely destroyed. 
Seed is wanting, trade is stopped, industries are ruined. As a start in 
the direction of reconstruction, the Allies have given Serbia, to be 
shared with Greece and Rumania, 6 per cent of the total indemnity 
exacted from Germany. Yet this is not enough to re-create her in- 
dustries and to revive her industrial and commercial life, even if it 
could be obtained at once ; and there is no certainty that it can be 
collected at all. As we have emphasized in an earlier chapter, the 
Central Powers destroyed far more than they can be made to repay 
(page 78). Serbia, like Belgium and northern France, will long retain 
the scars of war. 



CHAPTER FIFTEEN 



People of 
the Ru- 
manian 
homeland 



RUMANIA WITHIN ITS NEW FRONTIERS 

The life and history of the Rumanians is closely associated with the 
Carpathian valleys and bordering plains. Their settlements extend 
from within the edge of the Hungarian plain eastward to the Rlack 
Sea, and throughout the valleys of the southern Carpathians as far 
south as the Iron Gate of the Danube. Farther north they have 
long occupied the Ressarabian foothill region of the Carpathians. In 
the Timok valley in Serbia south of the Danube, there is a Rumanian 
area which has been made the basis for a claim to extend the 
Rumanian frontier toward Relgrade. In Transylvania, deep notched 
by rivers, the people live in farms and villages on the narrow valley 
floors and on flat-topped ridges and spurs where pasture abounds. 
The greater part of the Rumanians live on the Moldavian- Wallachian 
plain between the Carpathians and the Danube. 

More than 80 per cent of the population live on farms, and they 
are not easily won to an industrial life. In the whole Rumanian 
region (Fig. 143) there is a population of 16,000,000, and so com- 
pletely do Rumanians occupy the land that there are only about 
3,750,000 non-Rumanian peoples included within the present bound- 
aries : 1,500,000 Magyars, 400,000 Germans, 1,100,000 Ukrainians, 
and 750,000 Jews. It is a compact and virile nation, ranking 
(roughly) with Czecho-Slovakia in present economic power. 



Turkish 
invasion 



Carpathian 
gateways 
and the 
Danubian 
moat 



THE ORIGINS OF THE RUMANIAN STATE 

The rise of the Rumanian nation is an event of recent times. When 
the Turk occupied southeastern Europe and annexed Hungary in 
the 15th century, he turned his attention to the Rumanians, who 
fought valiantly under Stephen the Great, only to be defeated under 
the leadership of his son. Thereafter the Turk received the homage 
of the Rumanian and Transylvanian princes, though he never over- 
ran their country completely. This nominal overlordship continued 
until 18^9, when, by the treaty of Adrianople, Czar Nicholas of 
Russia obliged the Turkish government to grant practically complete 
autonomy to Moldavia and WaUachia, the two chief provinces of 
modern Rumania. 

That the country of the Rumanians was never overrun by the Turk 
was due to the defensive wall of the Carpathians, rugged and forested, 
with few defiles, which kept the Turk invader from entering Rumania 
by the Carpathian passes from the west after his conquest of Hun- 

278 



Rumania witJiin its New Frontiers 



279 







Rumanians 
Other Nationalities 
Present boundaries 



I . I Mixed Rumanians and other Nationalities 
^;Sf'-i7;'^ Mixed Nationalities other than Rumanian 
Former boundaries 




Key to Fig. 143. 



Fig. 143. Ethnography of the Rumanian region. From the 
British General Staff ethnographic maps of Europe, scale 
1 : 1,500,000, with modifications from De Martonne, Annales de 
Geographic, March 1920. Key to numerals: 1, Rumanians; 
2, Jugo-Slavs ; 3, Bulgarians ; 4, Turks ; 5, Greeks ; 6, Germans ; 
7, Ukrainians (Ruthenians) ; 8, Magyars; 9, Czecho-Slovaks ; 
10, Poles. Bessarabia was made a part of Rumania by treaty 
with the powers, but final settlement depends upon further 
negotiation with a reconstituted Russia (page 289). 



gary. And the broad and then unbridged Danube, its lower course 
bordered by wide, impassable reed swamps, was a protective moat at 
the edge of the fertile plains. After years of effort the Turk gained 
access to the Rumanian plains, only to find the population fleeing 
before him to the mountains. Thus the infusion of Tatar blood in 
Rumania is very small. Thus likewise the Rumanian was spared 
those religious and national antagonisms between the various Christian 
populations which the Turk always stirred up in order to strengthen 
his own hold on the subject races. The Rumans therefore have had 
a greater national and cultural solidarity than any other Balkan 
people except the Greeks. 



280 



The New World 



French and 

Russian 

influence 



The treaty 
of Bucarest 
of 1918 



Russian political influence in Rumania became marked with the 
revival, beginning about 1850, of efforts to defeat the Turk and reach 
the Dardanelles. Under Napoleon III, France began to work for 
the independence of Rumania, not so much to encourage the forma- 
tion of a Rmnanian nation as to thwart the ambitions of the Czar ; 
and to this day French cultural influence is stronger in Bucarest than 
that of any other nation. The Russians ended the mihtary opera- 
tions of the Crimean War with the treaty of Paris in 1856, by which 
Moldavia and Wallacliia were freed from Russian influence. In 1861 
the two provinces were at last united under a common ministry and 
with a common national assembly, and by 1878 the independence of the 
Kingdom of Rumania from both Russia and Turkey was finaUy ac- 
knowledged, but only after the loss of Bessarabia (formerly Rumanian) 
to Russia, following the Turko-Russian War of 1877-1878. 

During the years from the Congress of Berlin (1878) to the period 
of the Balkan wars (1912-1913), Rumania was occupied chiefly with 
questions of internal administration, and especially with difficulties 
relating to land tenure. There was also fear that Russian domi- 
nation would become overwhelming, and there were flurries of feeling 
against several other neighbors, as Hungary and Greece. But on the 
whole, Rumania was a spectator of the Balkan turmoil rather than 
a participant in it. She stayed out of the First Balkan War (1912) ; 
but in 1913 she joined the coalition against Bulgaria which fought the 
Second Balkan War, and by the treaty of Bucarest of 1913^ acquired 
from Bulgaria the Dobrudja, on the southeastern border. 

Rumania entered the World War on the side of the Allies in 1916, 
and for a time her fate was in doubt. When German troops under 
Von Mackensen defeated the Rumanian army in Transylvania in 
December of 1916, German armies streamed through the Carpathian 
passes and held a line athwart the Rumanian plain. By the terms of 
the treaty of Bucarest of 1918, Rumania was to lose a strip of terri- 
tory averaging five miles in width along the Carpathian frontier, includ- 
ing aU the passes, observation posts, and valley heads that looked down 
upon the fertile plains and the capital city ; and also valuable oil conces- 
sions (Fig. 144). Her losses included the Iron Gate of the Danube. 
This would have made her defenseless in any future war with the 
Central Powers. The treaty was never promulgated. It was drawn 
up in July 1918, but King Ferdinand saw to it that his prime minis- 



1 Two recent treaties are named after the Rumanian capital r (a) the treaty of Bucarest 
of 1913, which ended the Second Balkan War ; and (6) the treaty of Bucarest of 1918, be- 
tween the Central Powers and Rumania, which was to terminate the war with Rumania. 



Rumania within its Neiv Frontiers 



281 




Fig. 144. The eastern boundary of Rumania is the Dniester. The shaded areas were never 
legally transferred to Austria-Hungary or Bulgaria; the Rumanian king had not signed 
the treaty of Bucarest when the Austrian armistice of 4 November and the German armistice 
of 11 November 1918 required both these powers to abrogate the treaty. The shaded areas are : 
1, territory to be ceded to Austria-Hungary according to treaty of Bucarest; 2, to Bulgaria; 
3, to the Central Powers. Carpathian boundary of treaty of Bucarest of 1918 according to 1918 
edition of Stieler's Hand-Atlas. Oil localities after Draghicenu, Geologisrhe Ubersichtskarte'des 
Konigreiches rumanien, 1891; Redwood, Treatise on Petroleum, Yol.l, 1913; Deutsche Rundschau 
fur Geographie, Vol. 24, 1901-02, p. 418. 



ter was never able to find him. He traveled through mountains and 
forests, and before his signature could be obtained, Marshal Foch 
had begun to strike the western German front from Chateau Thierry 
to the North Sea. By the armistice of 11 November 1918, Germany 
was forced to denounce the treaty of Bucarest. Thus Rumania had 
restored to her the Dobrudja up to the boundary of 1913, and the 
way was opened for broad extensions of territory on both her eastern 
and her western frontiers. 

In the 1918 edition of Stieler's famous Hand- Atlas, it is interesting 
to find the new boundary of Rumania in the Carpathians shown by a 
red over-printed line — probably the only case in which these thorough 
German cartographers have placed on a map as an international 
boundary a line that was never established. 



282 



The New World 



Racial ele- 
ments in 
Rumania 



Relation of 
Rumanian 
life to the 
mountains 



THE PEOPLE OF RUMANIA 

The Rumanians, or Wallachians 

The Rumanians, or Wallachs (hence Wallachia), are of mixed race 
but of distinct speech, the Ruman, which is based on Low Latin. 
Tliey claim to be descendants of the ancient Roman inhabitants of 
the frontier province of Dacia in the days of the Roman Empire. 
They have absorbed Gothic, Tatar, and Slavic invaders, but pride 
in their Roman ancestry has led Rumanian authors more and more 
to ehminate Slavic words from their vocabulary and to make their 
language resemble the Latin more closely. Words relating to agri- 
cultural pursuits are generally of Slavic origin — an indication of the 
large amount of Slavic blood in the peasantry, whose origin is less 
closely related to the Roman legionaries and officials that once dwelt 
in the province than to the early Slavs that swept eastward over 
their plains in successive waves of migration. Latin influences among 
the people are stiU marked, however, although their form of Chris- 
tianity is Ryzantine, not Roman ; they are nearly all adherents of 
the Greek Orthodox Church. 

The mountains of Rumania are celebrated in Ruman verse and 
romance no less than in history. This is clearly understood if we but 
remember that for a time they were the refuge of Rumanian nation- 
ahty, when Slav and Tatar successively held the plain. The Ru- 
manian came to know the passes, the mountain pastures, the secluded 
valleys, and the defensible gateways to the plain. When the people 
were able at last to reoccupy the plain and resume their agricultural 
life, they kept up their spiritual as well as their material connection 
with the mountains. Every summer the cattle still are driven to 
the high, rich mountain pastures. Every winter many of them are 
driven down again to the shelter of the deeper vaUeys and the plain. 
Many Rumanians have a plains residence and a mountain residence, 
to fit their twin occupations of farmer and shepherd. It is a distinc- 
tive form of seasonal migration, or nomadism. 



Home 
places 
of the 
nomadic 
Vlachs 



The Vlachs 

Rumanian nomadism is seen in its purest form among the detached 
bands of people of Rumanian speech that inhabit parts of Macedonia, 
Albania, and Thrace — the Vlachs, or Kutzo- Vlachs. Many of their 
villages are inhabited only in winter; in summer they roam the 
mountain pastures with their herds and flocks. Colonies of them, 
each with its own dialect, live in the Olympus ranges, in the upper 



Rumania within its New Frontiers 



283 




Fig. 145. The Vlachs, or pastoral nomads of Rumanian affiliation, in the central Balkan lands. 
From British General Staff ethnic map, 1 : 1,500,000, 1918. 

Semeni and Devol valleys and at Frasheri in Albania, at Okhrida and 
Krushevo and Monastir, in the Vardar valley in Macedonia, and along 
the Greco-Bulgarian frontier. Several times in the first decade of this 
century they were the cause of disputes between Rumania and Greece, 
disputes arising from the vigorous campaign of Pan-Hellenism which 
the Greeks were carrying on in the Macedonian region. 

Rumanians and Magyars in Transylvania 

Their close historical association with the mountains has welded in-eden- 
together the Transylvanian peoples and those of Wallachia and j^^^^lf' 
Moldavia. In later years it fostered the irredentist movement which late years 
arose from the cruelties of the Magyar oppressor. Two and a half 
million Rumanians of Transylvania wished to join their kinsmen on 
the eastern side of the mountains and form an independent state. 



^84 



Tlie New World 



11 








— ^/\ Inward migration 
< — []j Outward migration 
^^ Emigration 






M Magyars 
6 Germans 
Rm Rumanians 
SI Slovaks 
SC Serbo- Croats 






)V© /^ 



^ 









C^^CRni 







s 
.'s 



(^ <<-© 






..-^..-^ 



^ 

V . RUMANIAN HUNGARY 

/ MOVEMENT OF THE POPULATION 

Scale of miles 



THE GE06R. REVfEW.Auo 1918 



Fig. 146. The territory east of the heavy line has been awarded to Rumania. Magyar perse- 
cution before 1914 is suggested by a study of Rumanian emigration. After Wallis, in the 
Geographical Reciew, August 1918. 

They constitute half of the population of Transylvania and are the 
largest single ethnic element there. The others are Magyars, Jews, 
Ruthenians, Slovaks, and Germans. Kolozvar, the capital of Tran- 
sylvania, is said to be an important center of intellectual and pubhc 
life in Hungary. 

Transylvania has a population of 2,700,000, for the most part 
agricultural and pastoral, with a relatively small city element. The 
Rumanians of Transylvania are chiefly illiterate peasants, hillmen, 
and herdsmen whose permanent homes and villages are scattered along 
the narrow valley floors or in a belt of plains population just west of 
the mountains, at the eastern edge of the plain of the Tisza. Their 
western limit is marked by a number of important towns — Arad, 
Nagy Varad and Temesvar in the Banat. It also corresponds closely 
to a belt of dense population (dense in contrast to the light population 
of the rest of Transylvania) which has increased the difficulty of 
separating these Rumanians from the Magyars of the plains. Travel 



Rumar .a within its New Frontiers 



285 



Whole Population 

1680 1690 1900 1910 
Increase 
% 
50 




Magyars 

1880 1890 1900 1910 



Germans 

1880 1890 1900 1910 



Rumanians 

1880 1890 1900 1910 

I I I 



- RUMANIAN HUNGARY -J 

POPULATION GROWTH 

BY 

NATIONALITIES AND DIVISIONS 



Transylvania. 



— — — Rumanian Forelands 




50 



Fig. 147. Diagram showing, by nationalities and divisions, the population growth in Rumanian 
Hungary from 1880 to 1910 and the privileged position of the Magyar. Logarithmic scale. 
After Wallis, in the Geographical Review, 1918- 



and transportation from one valley to another proceeds, not over the 
intervening forested ridge, but down the valley to the plain and back 
again to a neighboring valley. The new boundary, established by 
the treaty of peace with Hungary, includes in Transylvania — that is, 
in Rumania — the railroads and towns at the edge of the plain. To 
have left them out would have completely deranged the commercial 
life of the region. It should be noted, however, tha this arrangement 
to an equal or greater degree deranges the commercial life of Hungary, 
and it is hard to believe that the boundary will permanently remain 
in its present position Highly intelligent IVIagyars are here placed 
in great numbers under the rule of a people of lower culture. In some 
districts, especially in the towns they are locally in the majority. Irre- 
dentism will almost surely follow, unless more good comes from the 
application of the questionable minorities treaties (page 275) than 
can now be foreseen. 

The antagonism between Magyars and Rumanians has been in- Religious 
creased by religious differences, which always tend to reenforce dif- *^^^^'^- 

'> ^ ^ ^ ^ ences 

ferences of "race" and speech. The Magyars are Roman Catholics 



286 



The New World 



Problem of 
the Ru- 
manian 
Jew 







Fig. 148. A view in the timbered zone of the Transylvanian Alps. 

chiefly ; the Germans are Roman Catholics or Lutherans ; while the 
Rumanians belong to the Greek Orthodox Church. 

THE QUESTION OF MINORITIES 

There are more than 750,000 Jews in Rumania, and there would 
be many more but for anti- Jewish laws that have led to a steady stream 
of emigration. In the past hundred years these laws, to the number of 
several score, have denied equality to the Jew in the trades and handi- 
crafts and in landholding, education, the professions, etc. To the 
Rumanian the problem looked much as the Japanese problem appears 
to a Californian. One of the considerations was the fear that all the 
land would be owned by the Jews unless restrictive measures were 
enforced. 

The expulsion of Jews from Rumania before 1878, and their perse- 
cution, induced the makers of the treaty of Rerlin of that year to 
demand of Rumania full citizenship for the Jew. Less than a thou- 
sand Jews were then naturalized, but in a few years the treaty pro- 
visions were abandoned altogether. One restriction after another 
diminished Jewish rights until all Jews were practically without 
standing under the law. 



Rumania within its New Frontiers 287 

The Jews of Rumania offer a problem that has taken on an inter- 
national character, now that Rumania has signed the minorities treaty 
with the AUied and Associated Powers, a compact which pledges her 
to give equality of privilege to all minority peoples (page 275). Ru- 
mania, mindful of the servitudes of the treaty of Berlin, long refused 
to sign the treaty, and the utmost diplomatic pressure was necessary 
to secure the signatures of her representatives at Paris in 1919. But for 
Alhed assistance Rumania would have been destroyed in the World 
War, and this fact gave the Allied powers a strong argument in im- 
posing the minorities clauses. It should be noted, however, that Allied 
assistance was pledged as a condition of Rumanian entry into the war. 

It is doubtful if Rumania means to keep the terms of the treaty, 
for its significance pertains chiefly to the Jew. Czecho-Slovakia, 
Jugo-Slavia, Poland, and others were obliged to sign similar treaties, 
by which the Jews, the most widely distributed and generally per- 
secuted minority element of the population, are enabled to combine 
in a powerful central European organization to force the League of 
Nations to take account of future persecutions or restrictions. 

Equality of treatment to the degree specified in the treaties places Minorities 
restrictions upon the action of a people in making laws or modifying goy^j-crof 
their constitution that may prove unendurable. Such restrictions are irredentism 
reaUy a limitation of national sovereignty respecting internal affairs. 
They are justifiable only if the League of Nations will see that the 
minorities do not become a privileged class and do not carry on cease- 
less and unjustifiable agitation. In the United States there is soli- 
darity, in part through a common language. In central Europe the 
languages of the minorities are retained, and the state is compelled 
.to countenance and even to develop them. Linguistic differences 
will be perpetuated and even increased. Irredentism will continue. 
Many of the wisest men of Europe and America deprecate these 
treaties ; they regard them as a standing invitation to quarrel. 

THE BORDER REGIONS^ 

There remain to consider certain other areas where people mainly of 
Rumanian speech have now come under one national flag — Buko- 
vina, Bessarabia, and the eastern Banat. There is also to be consid- 
ered the Dobrudja region, in Rumanian possession since the end of 
the Second Balkan War (1913). 

1 In addition to the territorial gains mentioned in this section, Rumania receives by treaty 
the island of Ada-Kalessi in the Danube. It is made a condition of the grant of this island 
that it is to be demilitarized. 



288 



The New World 



Bukovina 

Bukovina, with an area of 4000 square miles, was a crown province 
of Austria at the opening of the World War. Though Austria has held 
it since 1777, its people are chielly Runians, Ruthenians, and Germans. 
The Rumans settled here by spreading northwcU"d from their plains 
country, which is continuous with that of Bukovina. They number at 
present a full third of the population, or about 275,000 out of a total 
of 800,000. The Ruthenians spread southward from Galicia and con- 
stitute more than a third of the total, or about 300,000. The Ger- 
mans, about 170,000 in number, came as artisans and traders from 
Transylvania and Galicia. 

The treaty of St. Germain (Austria) allots to Rumania all of 
Bukovina except the territory crossed by the railroad running from 
Lalcszcyki to Kolomea ; but it is interesting to note that the allot- 
ment is made on condition that Rumania keeps faith with the Allies. 
The small portion of Bukovina left out of Rumania is given to 
Poland, to include an important railroad junction on the Pohsh 
frontier. 

The land is densely populated — 198 to the square mile — but 
the cultural level of the people is very low. Illiteracy was higher 
here than anywhere else in Austria-TTuugary, except in Dahnatia. 
A third of the land is arable; half of it is forest covered. It is a 
country rich in agricultural resources and pasture lands. 



Bessarabia 

Bessarabia is the region between the Pruth and the Dniester. Its 
population of 2,700,000 is composed of over 1,000,000 Rumanians, 
900,000 Ukrainians, scattered German colonists (Fig. 100), and 
800.000 Jews. The Rumanians live in northern Bessarabia, on the 
broad hilly spurs of eastern oifshoots of the Carpathians between the 
Dniester and the Pruth. The flat, marshy, treeless tracts along the 
Pruth and at the mouths of the Danube are occupied by Cossacks 
and Tatars. The mixture of races and the historical changes of 
ownership record the repeated migrations that passed over Bessarabia ; 
Turk and Slav both made this region a corridor of conquest. 

WliiFe more than half the people of Bessarabia are of Rumanian blood, 
there is not a clearly defined ethnic division, as in Poland or Czecho- 
slovakia or Greece. Moreover, their culture is closely connected with 
that to the east of them. The Bessarabian people use the Cyrillic, 
not the Latin, alphabet ; and the peasants all use the Russian language. 



Rumania within its New Frontiers 289 

Bessarabia was a part of Russia from 1812 to 1856 ; a strip along the Beginnings 
Black Sea was then restored to Rumania, but was returned to Russia by rlwarhi- 
the Berhn Congress of 1878. With the fall of the autocratic Russian dependence 
government, early in 1917, Bessarabian peasants took over all the 
land; but it was not until May 1917 that a "National Committee" 
was set up. In the autumn of that year there was a congress of 
Moldavian soldiers and officers which proclaimed the autonomy of 
Bessarabia. This congress elected a "Council of the Land," which in 
December 1917 formally proclaimed the country a republic. The 
Council maintained an orderly government, and when anarchy broke 
loose in Russia and overwhehncd the Ukraine (including Odessa), 
the Bessarabians held the frontier along the Dniester. Since January 
1919, Rumanian military forces have occupied the country on the plea 
of maintaining a defense against Bolshevism, thus creating a complex 
political problem. 

The National Council formed during the Rumanian military occu- 
pation to supplant the Council of the Land was a Rumanian invention. 
It was what may be called a "rump" assembly, with no mandate from 
the people, and it was this Council that twice in 1918 asked for an- 
nexation to Rumania. Those who opposed its decrees were deported 
or imprisoned ; democratic local governments were dissolved ; Bessa- 
rabian judges were dismissed and courts abolished; all but pro- 
Rumanian newspapers were suppressed. Rumanians have also ex- 
propriated the estates of the large landowners. 

In October 1920 there was signed a treaty between Rumania on 
the one hand and Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan on the 
other, whereby Rumania is to receive Bessarabia. Minority rights 
are safeguarded by the usual clauses (page 276). Boundary ques- 
tions are to be settled by a commission of the League of Nations, 
which likewise determines the proportional part of the Russian 
national debt that Rumania must assume with the addition of 
Bessarabia. Provision is made for consideration by the Council of 
the League of Nations of future objections and changes proposed 
by Russia, though pledges are given that such consideration will not 
affect Rumanian sovereignty as estabhshed by the present treaty. 
This clause, however, will almost certainly undergo revision if Russia 
emerges as a powerful state within the next few years. The United 
States is not a party to the treaty, having held that whether or not it 
joins the League of Nations it cannot approve the dismemberment of 
Russia without the consent of the Russian people and while that 
country is controlled by an unrepresentative government. 



290 



The New World 



Border 
region of 
the Banat 



The Eastern Banat 

In ths territorial settlements of Europe, the disposition of the 
Banat was a question in which Rumania and Jugo-Slavia had an equal 
interest with Hungary (page 272). It seemed impracticable to assign 
the whole region to any one of the three claimants ; yet to separate 
the Rumanians of the eastern Banat from the Serbs, Magyars, and 
Germans, who live in the western half of the district, in a measure 
disorganizes the commercial life of the region. 

The Banat is a very rich farming country with many railways and 
towns. It is just such a region as a rough hill country, like Serbia, 
would wish to obtain to supplement her deficient food supply. The 
language distributions are shown in Figure 142. They indicate clearly 
that Rumanian speech is dominant in the two eastern counties of 
Krasso-Szoreny and Temes, while Torontal on the west is chiefly Serb. 

It should be noted that the new north-south boundary in the Banat 
cuts across all the westward-flowing streams and also the railways and 
canals. It will take years to readjust the commercial life to the new 
arrangements. In the division of the region it was stipulated that 
agreements between Rumania and Serbia should be made at an early 
date to maintain and develop the irrigation canals for the benefit 
of both countries. 



Possi- 
bility of 
trouble 
in the 
Dobrudja 



The Dobrudja 

]n the present Rumanian occupation of the Dobrudja, the southern 
part of which is almost exclusively Bulgarian in population, there 
is a real cause for future trouble. After 1878, the year when, by 
the treaty of Berlin, Rumania got control of a large part of the 
Dobrudja region, the Rumanian government expropriated the lands 
of the inhabitants on a large scale, and even made the peasants pay 
for what was left to them. The expropriated lands were then sold to 
Rumanian colonists. Many property owners were reduced to poverty ; 
others emigrated to America, Bulgaria, Russia, and Turkey, and a 
country theretofore prosperous was thrown into disorder. 

The same methods have been followed since 1913, when, by the 
treaty of Bucarest which closed the Second Balkan War, Rumania 
won another slice of Bulgarian territory in the Dobrudja. It remains 
to be seen whether Rumania has profited by the lessons of the World 
War, or whether she will continue to exploit an alien people unfairly 
in the attempt to Rumanize it or expel it. If she foUows a selfish 
course, trouble with Bulgaria is bound to come. 



Rumania within its New Frontiers 291 

RUMANIAN INVASION OF HUNGARY 

As an example of the difficulties which the larger powers meet in 
dealing with new states, we may cite the case of Rumania, which 
from a state of 8,000,000 has been raised by the action of the AUies 
to a state of nearly 16,000,000. It might be supposed that a state 
which owed its continued existence and the enlargement of its terri- 
tory chiefly to the Allied armies would be wiUing to heed the direc- 
tions of its protectors. Let us glance at Rumania's record during 
the invasion of Hungary in the summer of 1919. 

Rumanian troops crossed the Allied demarcation line in Hun- Rumanian 
garian Transylvania in late July and took Budapest, the Hungarian occupation 
capital, in August. They drained the city and the country of re- 
sources — food, rolling stock, live stock, war materials, etc. Only 
the sharpest notes by the Allied powers brought their withdrawal in 
October 1919. 

The Rumanians say that the Hungarians broke the armistice terms 
by reenforcing their army, mobilizing the young men, and attacking 
the Rumanian troops. Rumanian leaders say, further, that the armi- 
stice of 4 November 1918 with Austria, and that of 11 November with 
Germany, gave the AUied powers vast quantities of cars, locomotives, 
money, implements, * and coal. Rumania received nothing. She 
had steadfastly and gallantly fought on the side of the Allies, losing 
more than 332,000 in dead alone from the army, and as many more 
from the •civilian population. She fought the Bolshevists in Bes- 
sarabia. Her land was devastated almost from end to end. Enemy 
troops stripped the country, taking food, telegraph and telephone wires, 
ammunition, live stock, grain, and other supplies. The Rumanians 
point out that in contrast to Rumania, Czecho-Slovakia was never 
invaded ; that Jugo-Slavia obtained a great deal of material in Hun- 
gary and Slavonia ; that Rumania repeatedly asked for economic help 
and could not obtain it ; and that it was a choice between (1) helping 
herself to the things that had been taken from her by Hungary and 
(2) facing internal disorder and outside pressure brought to bear 
upon her by the Bolshevists. 

It will not soon be forgotten in European poHtical circles how The 
readily the oppressed can become the oppressor, and how quickly a weak oppressed 
nation, as soon as it gathers strength itself, can adopt the outrageous oppressors 
methods of which it so loudly complained in the past. The new states 
of central Europe have yet to demonstrate that they possess moral 
strength equal to their new-found opportunities. 



292 



TJie New World 



Rumania 
free of 
Bolshevism 



Land prob- 
lems and 
peasant 
revolts in 
recent 
years 



THE RUMANIA OF TODAY 

It is noteworthy that the disease of Bolshevism is virtually un- 
known in Rumania, — a disease due chiefly to the break-up of the 
feudal system that long persisted in Russia and Hungary, where but 
a few landlords held a farming peasantry in virtual slavery. Ru- 
mania once had the same system; its destruction began in 1864, 
when the large estates owned by the monasteries were confiscated 
and each peasant family was given a farm between seven and a half 
and fifteen acres in extent. Over 400,000 peasants shared in the dis- 
tribution of 4,000,000 acres.i 

But the farms were still too small, in general, for the needs of peasant 
families, and in 1889 the government divided all the state domains — 
about one third of the total Eirea of the country — into small parcels 
which were sold to peasant famihes. In 1907 the peasants stiU felt 
themselves so poor that they broke into revolt, and at the beginning 
of the World War the disorders were again repeated, each time end- 
ing in new action by the government to divide the remaining large 
estates and better the lot of the farmer. In 1912 there were 3755 
large estates, while the peasant holdings, numbering more than 
1,000,000, were stiU too small for the needs of the population. Never- 
theless, the process of land division had gone so far that the Rumanian 
rulers were justifiably confident of an orderly people when Bolshevism 
overran the countries on either side. 

Today, 40 per cent of the Rumanian land in old Rumania is in the 
hands of the large landowners. In Transylvania the big proprietors 
hold only 8 per cent. Under the new Rumanian land act, one half of 
the remainder of the big estates in Rumania is to be divided, so that 
only 20 per cent of the arable land will remain in the form of large 
estates. In Transylvania the Rumanians, under the guise of a re- 
form in agriculture, are dispossessing and expeUing the big Magyar 
landowners, thus leaving the Magyar peasants without leaders. 
Such is the Rumanian law that the state may take away land from the 
estates of all persons not of Rumanian citizenship. The minorities 
treaty will affect this law, but its provisions have yet to be tried by 
the fires of experience. Unless changed, the law means that forest 



- ^ An exception to the general rule of land distribution in Rumania is found in the area 
inhabited by the Szeklers, where small landholdings are the rule, and have been so for hun- 
dreds of years. In the 12th century the free Saxons colonized the region. There came a 
first hberation of serfs in the same region in 1848, a process that was completed in 1861. 
Altogether, about 1,200,000 acres, or one half the arable land in the possession of big land- 
owners in the region, was divided among the peasants. 



Rumania within its New Frontiers 



293 




Fig. 149. Population density and boundaries of Rumania. The boundary of 1914 was on the 
Pruth River, but Rumania now holds Bessarabia, a former province of Russia. Her position 
there has been confirmed by treaty with Great Britain, France, Italy, and Japan, but not with 
either the United States or Russia. Adapted from De Martonne, Annales de Geographie, March 
1920, supplemented by Petermanns Mitteilumjen, 1913, Vol. I, PI. 2. Key to place names not 
spelled in full on the map : 



T. S. 


Turnu Severin 


Bo. 


Botosani 


N. 


Nagy Kikinda 


V. 


Versecz (Banat) 


M. V. 


Maros Vasarhely 


H. 


Hatszeg 


N. K. 


Nagy Karoly 


Kr. 


Kronstadt 


Bi. 


Bistritz 


M. 


Munkdcs 


S. 


Sulina 


M. S. 


Marmaros Sziget 


S. N. 


Szatmar Nemeti 


B. 


Bender 


I. 


Ismail 


K. 


Kolomea 


V. 


Vidin (Danube) 







lands and oil fields owned by foreigners, such as the British, French, 
and Italians, can be expropriated by the Rumanian government. 

The wealth of Rumania is very great. The agricultural lands have 
long been famous for bountiful crops of wheat, maize, barley, oats, rye, 
and millet. Hemp, flax, wine, sugar beets, tobacco, and cotton are 
other important products. In the foothiUs of the Carpathians are 
large petroleum deposits in process of development by foreign capi- 
talists (heretofore chiefly Germans), who hold 8 per cent of the in- 
vested capital. The production is about 13,500,000 barrels a year, or 
3.5 per cent of the world's supply. The chief localities of pro- 
duction are shown in Figure 144. 



Economic 
assets of 
the new 
state 



294 



The New World 



Rumania 

and 

Poland as a 

barrier 

against 

Bolshevism 



Deposits of coal, iron, copper, and lead also have been discovered 
in the mountain country. All these resources are very little de- 
veloped, and the vast forest wealth is almost untouched. 

An agricultural country, with mining and forest wealth little 
developed, Rumania has few large cities today. There are only the 
beginnings of industries. The most important trade centers are 
Braila and Galatz on the Danube, and Constanza on the Black Sea, 
all of them grain-exporting towns of rapidly growing importance. 

Rumania stands in the world's family of nations, not as a weaker 
member, but as a vigorous state of growing power. National feeling 
was never so intense. Her financial system, based on the gold standard, 
is sound ; her resources, though largely undeveloped, are vast ; her 
leaders are intellectually alert and capable. She has been orderly in the 
midst of disorder, and now that her territory extends into Bukovina 
and that of Poland extends eastward to include all of Gahcia, these 
two nations occupy a belt from the Baltic to the Black Sea, and are 
thus more likely to have a common policy with respect to Russia. 
Thus the government signed a treaty, early in 19^1,. with Poland 
and Hungary which sought to solidify the opposition of these two 
states to a possible attack by the Bolshevist army. 



CHAPTER SIXTEEN 

BULGARIA UNDER THE TREATY OF NEUILLY 

In Spite of a deficiency of mineral wealth, the Bulgarian nation had 
risen notably in the twenty-five years before the First Balkan War. 
At least some coal and iron mines had been opened, a few industries 
had developed, railways had been extended, the commerce of the 
state had increased 500 per cent. A population of more than 
3,000,000 in 1888 had grown to 4,300,000 by 1910. To this number 
as a result of the Balkan wars of 1912 and 1913, Bulgaria added a 
net gain of 130,000 people. 

From the time when the Turk overran Bulgaria, even before the Growth of 
capture of Constantinople in 1453, down to 1885, the northern Bui- e^te^and 
gars in the principality of Bulgaria, beyond the Balkan range, were national 
separated from those in the southern province of Rumelia. The 
Bulgarians of northern Bulgaria obtained their autonomy in 1878 by 
the treaty of Berhn, which ended the Turko-Russian War ; but their 
national history in modern times may be said to date from 1885, 
when, by the revolution of Philippopohs, they were joined to eastern 
Rumelia ; and from that time onward, though the Bulgars were still 
under the suzerainty of the Turkish sultan, the growth of national 
feeling was rapid. Finally, in 1908, taking advantage of the Young 
Turk Revolution in Constantinople, the Bulgarian prince proclaimed 
himself Czar of the Bulgarians, and the country became completely 
independent of Turkey. 

BULGARIAN AMBITIONS AND THEIR OUTCOME 

When Bulgaria became independent, she was in an excellent posi- Beginnings 
tion for growth into a modern state. The problem of the great land- °^ imperial 
owner had never vexed either the peasant or the government ; small 
farmers had always been in possession of the soil. There had con- 
sequently grown up a spirit of independence that in turn devel- 
oped intense patriotism and willingness to sacrifice for the national 
security and power. All would have been weU but for the growth of 
an excessive nationalistic ambition. Bulgaria wanted to control 
the whole Balkan peninsula. Had her expansion been only at the 
expense of the Turk, the world would have applauded; but it was 
to be also at the expense of neighboring powers as worthy as herself. 
It was inevitable that such a course should end in disaster. 

295 



296 



The New World 



War with 
Turkey in 
1912 — the 
First Bal- 
kan War 



The Bal- 
kan cam- 
paigns of 
1912-1913 



Terms of 
the treaty 
of London, 
1913 



The First Balkan War 

The next step in the Bulgarian drama was taken in 1912, when 
Bulgaria made a secret treaty with Serbia, which was soon followed 
by similar treaties with Greece and Montenegro. The object of the 
four states was to drive the Turk out of the Balkans and if possible 
into Asia, and thus not only liberate the persecuted Christian popu- 
lations of Macedonia but also end the Turkish menace at their own 
doors. Each state agreed to put into the field a given number of 
troops and faithfully to play its part in the final act. 

These arrangements were made when Turkey was embgirrassed by 
the war with Italy (1911-1912). That war ended with Turkey en- 
feebled and discouraged. Disorders broke out again in Macedonia and 
Albania. In October 1912, hostilities were begun by the Balkan states. 
The armies of Turkey, poorly equipped and disease-stricken, numbered 
less than 500,000 ; those of the Balkan allies were nearly 800,000, 
of which number Bulgaria alone had 350,000 and Serbia 250,000. 

The first contest came at Adrianople and Kirk Kihsse. The latter 
was captured, the former besieged. Farther south, on the hne from 
Lule Burgas to Bunar Hissar, came the decisive battle of the war, 
a fierce four-day contest on a front of more than twenty miles, with 
losses of 50,000. The power of the Turk was broken. He retreated 
to Chatalja, twenty-five miles from Constantinople, and there fought 
out the winter, while the Montenegrins captured Scutari in north- 
ern Albania, the Greeks captured Yannina, and the Serbo-Bulgar 
armies took Adrianople. Earlier in the war, the Greeks had cap- 
tured Saloniki and the Serbs had overrun Macedonia. The Turk 
retained only a toe-hold in Europe. 

Turkey agreed to make peace, and by the treaty of London, May 
1913, ceded all territory west and north of a straight line from Enos 
on the i^gean to Midia on the Black Sea (Fig. 150). She also gave 
up Crete to Greece and permitted the great powers to determine the 
final disposition of the ^^gean islands and of Albania. 

The whole world had recognized the heroic work and brilliant 
success of the Balkan armies. There was therefore general dismay 
when the Balkan states fell to quarreling, and at last to fighting, over 
former Turkish territory. The situation may be summarized thus : 

(1) Bulgaria wanted and had been promised most of the captured 
territory. 

(2) Serbia, blocked in Albania by the action of the great powers 
(they set up an independent Albania in 1913), had there lost a 



Bulgaria under the Treaty of Neuilly 



297 




298 



The New World 



Second 
Balkan 
War — 
causes and 
efifects 



chance of access to the sea, and now wanted an outlet at 
Saloiiiki. She therefore claimed a part of Macedonia. 

(3) But Greek armies had captured the town of Saloniki ; Greece 
also wished a part of the Macedonian coast. 

(4) Montenegro felt that she had received no substantial reward. 

(5) Seeing Bulgaria gain territory elsewhere, Rumania urged that 
she be given the southern Dobrudja at Bulgaria's expense. 

The Second Balkan War 

Thereupon followed the Second Balkan War, in which Turkey 
joined Greece, Serbia, Rumania, and Montenegro against Bulgaria. 
The Tiu-ks retook Adrianople ; the Rumanians seized the Dobrudja 
and advanced to within twenty miles of Sofia, and Greeks and Serbs 
closed in on the west. After a two months' war (June- July 1913), 
Bulgaria was obhged to make peace, signing the treaty of Bucarest of 
1913, whereby : 

(1) Bulgaria gave up northern Macedonia to Serbia, including 
tiskiib and Okhrida. 

(2) Saloniki and southern Macedonia were given to Greece. 

(3) Bulgaria retained the town of Strmnitsa in eastern Macedonia 
and about seventy miles of the ^gean seacoast west of the 
jNIaritsa River, but not including the port of Kavala. 

(4) Montenegro got the western half of Novi Bazar. 

(5) The southern Dobrudja was ceded to Rumania. 

Bulgaria made a separate treaty with Turkey, and the line between 
them was drawn as shown in Figiu-e 150, thus shutting oif Bulgaria 
from direct rail connection (along the west bank of the Maritsa) 
with the .-Egean coast, except through Greek or Turkish territor>\ 

But the losses and gains in territory were a small matter compared 
with the bitter hatreds that the war had caused. Each of the Bal- 
kan states was even more jealous of the others than before, and the 
Bulgar felt himself humiUated and outraged. The nation had lost 
the flower of its manliood to win Adrianople and Lule Burgas in 1912, 
and now these strongholds were again under Turkish sovereignty. 
The hands of the clock could not be turned back ; Bulgaria suUenly 
waited her chance to retahate. 

Bulgaria's Part in the World War 

Bulgaria The opportunity came in the World War. In October 1915, after 

olrmM/iii negotiations with both sides in an effort to sell her alliance to the 
^915 highest bidder, Bulgaria joined Turkey and the Central Powers. 



The spirit 
of revenge 



I 



Bulgaria under the Treaty of Neuilly 



299 




300 The New World 

Her active part in the war was confined to military operations near 
the Serbian and Greek frontiers. She became also a thorough- 
fare between the Danube and the Bosporus for German artillery, 
aimnunition, and reeuforcements for the Turks. German officers con- 
trolled her armies on the Saloniki front. When the final Balkan drive 
of 1918 came, the Bulgar troops fled m disorder. 

According to the terms of the treaty of Neuilly between Bulgaria 
and the Allied and Associated Powers (1919), Bulgaria : 

Principal (1) Renounces all rights to territory formerly held by her outside 

terms of the boundarics shown on Figure 153. 

the treaty . . , • i • i 

with Bui- (2) Agrees to protect ahen minorities wilhm her realm under 

^^* terms laid down by the Allied and Associated Powers, and 

is assured hke protection of Bulgarian minorities in neigh- 
boring states. 

(3) Promises to reduce her army to 25,000 men, to destroy her 
vessels of war, to maintain no air forces, and to submit to 
the restrictions laid down with respect to war materials. 

(4) Agrees to pay 2,250,000,000 francs gold ($450,000,000) ; promises 
to restore the equivalent of requisitioned live stock; and 
acknowledges her obligation to contribute to the liquidation of 
the pre-war external Ottoman debt. She will also supply 50,000 
tons of coal annually to Jugo-Slavia for five years, in com- 
pensation for the destruction of Serbian mines. 

(5) Allots to Greece, Rumania, and Serbia live stock to the number 
of 70,000 head by way of restitution for animals taken by Bul- 
garia during the war, 

(6) Gives the Allied and Associated Powers most-favored-nation 
treatment and freedom of transit for goods and persons. She 
is guaranteed like freedom of transit to the ^gean. 

WHAT BULGARIA NOW FACES 

Problem l^i^G Germany and Austria, Bulgaria has now the enormous task 

of the of meeting the conditions of peace after a military defeat and the sur- 

render of a great quantity of war material in compliance with the 
terms of the armistice, and in the face of economic disorder that every- 
where, even in the Allied countries, has followed hard upon the long 
and terrible strain of war. Her people are profoundly discouraged. 
Hereafter, Bulgaria's path will be beset by grave difficulties. Hers 
is a country agriculturally well-favored, a land of farms, with no great 
mineral deposits, no large manufacturing toAvns. The largest city, 
Sofia, has a population of only about 100,000. The chief seaport, 
Varna, has about 40,000. The greater part of the population fives 



future 



Bulgaria under the Treaty of Neuilly 



301 




302 



The New World 



Bulgarians 
assigned to 
neighbor- 
ing states 



in a strip a hundred miles wide, south of the Danube. Aside from 
the fertihty of the soil, coal is the chief natural resource, and the 
amount of this is very small. The yield during 1911 was only about 
325,000 tons. There are also small amounts of iron, copper, and zinc, 
but the mines have been but little developed. 

Naturally poor in resources, Bulgaria has been losing man power 
rapidly for the past eight years. The Balkan wars took tens of thou- 
sands of her best men. These wars and the World War piled up a huge 
Bulgarian debt, which is now equivalent to the entire wealth of the 
country. It is impossible to calculate and impose revenues that will 
pay off this sum. Bulgaria is essentially bankrupt. Only the in- 
dustry of her people and the fertility of the soil are left to her out of 
which to make a nation. The cost of her aggression at the end of the 
First Balkan War, and of her union with Germany from 1915 to 1918, 
is the complete failure of her unwise plans to dominate the Balkans, 
a terrible loss of life and property, and a heightened reputation for 
cruelty to non-Bulgarian people in territory occupied by her troops. 

Bulgaria's neighbors have been given important groups of Bulgarian 
people. Greece in Thrace, Serbia in the Tsaribrod, Strumitsa, and 
Bosilegrad districts, and Rumania in the Dobrudja have acquired 
thousands of Bulgarians. The case of the southern Dobrudja is 
especially important. It became Bulgarian in 1878, is inhabited by 
Bulgarians and Turks to the number of 273,000, and was lost in 
1913 owing to Rumanian aggression, against which weakened Bulgaria 
could not offer resistance. Rumania wished to obtain the port of 
Baltchik on the Black Sea. 

On the other hand, we must remember : 

(1) That in September 1915 Bulgaria agreed to join Austria- 
Hungary against Serbia, and in return was to receive a certain 
share of Serbian land and people. 

(2) That Bulgarian authorities at one time declared that Serbia 
no longer existed, that it had become Bulgarian ; closed 
schools and churches and even burned them ; compelled the 
people to speak Bulgarian ; and, like the Germans in Belgium 
and northeastern France, levied fines and contributions, took 
away food, and ruined the country. 

(3) That out of tens of thousands of Serbians interned in Bul- 
garian camps, at least half died. 

(4) That Bulgarian outrages upon Greeks and Serbs — men, women, 
and children — were among the most hideous of the war. 

An unexpected difficulty for Bulgaria comes from the large numbers 
of refugee Bulgarians from Thrace, Macedonia, and the Dobrudja 



Bulgaria under the Treaty of Neuilly 



303 




304 



The New World 



Problem 
of the 
refugees 



that fled when those regions were occupied by Allied troops. They 
feared heavy reprisals. And some of them well deserved punish- 
ment. They have not yet established themselves in Bulgaria, and their 
unsettled life, their restless mood, may afi'ect their political and social 
views ; some of them have already become social agitators, preach- 
ing disorder and disloyalty to the government. They form one of 
the gravest of the internal problems of Bulgaria and may even affect 
the carrying out of the provisions of the peace treaty. 



Freedom 
of transit 
to Greek 
ports 



Areas ceded 
on the 
western 
frontier 



Difficulties 
created by 
new fron- 
tiers 



THE NEW BOUNDARY LINES 

The treaty of Neuilly between Bulgaria and the Allied and As- 
sociated Powers has given the whole of the ^^gean coast to Greece. 
Restriction to the three Bulgarian ports on the Black Sea would re- 
quire the roundabout routeing of goods ; for this reason Bulgaria is 
permitted to make use of the hne to Dedeagatch at the mouth of the 
Maritsa River and Kavala and Saloniki farther west. The "freedom 
of transit" clauses in the treaty compel Greece to furnish adequate 
facilities and security of transport for the commerce of western Bul- 
garia and southern Serbia ; and the Maritsa will be declared an inter- 
national river on the request of either Bulgaria or Greece. 

Bulgaria has also lost four areas on her western frontier : the Tsari- 
brod district, with 21,000 Bulgarians and practically no Serbs, the 
Bosilegrad district with 22,000 Bulgarians and no Serbs, the Strumitsa 
district, which is occupied by 25,000 inliabitants predominantly Bul- 
garian, mixed with Macedonians and a small number of Serbs, and 
the small area in the Timok valley on the northwest (Fig. 153). 

These areas were cut off on the ground that their possession by 
Bulgaria would threaten the railroad from Nish to Saloniki in time of 
war. It was by way of Tsaribrod that the Bulgarians invaded Serbia, 
cut the railroad line, and captured Nish, in the first few days after 
Bulgaria began operations in 1915. The cession of these areas brings 
the new boundary within thirty-five miles of Sofia, the capital of 
Bulgaria, and puts the frontier just west of the Dragoman Pass. 

In several instances the new boundaries of Bulgaria illustrate 
the local difficulties that may be caused by the passing of territory 
from one nation to another. For example, in western Thrace the 
Greek boundary runs along a hne of hills north of Xanthi and Gii- 
miirdjina, including the Karluk Mountains. It seems the best fron- 
tier if we start with the assumption that Greece must have the 
coastal strip ; the region being mountainous and partly forested, it 
would appear to separate the people in the valleys on either side of 



Bulgaria under the Treaty of Neuilly 305 

the mountains. But it happens that the mountains are valuable 
as summer pasture grounds for the herds and flocks of the plains 
dwellers to the south. Every autumn several hundred thousand head, 
chiefly sheep, are driven from the mountains to the plains. The new 
boundary breaks up this movement. 

There wiU probably be a marked shifting of population when the new internal 
boundaries in the Balkans are finally estabUshed by detailed surveys, ^ffessen- 
The hatreds which divide Balkan peoples are long-standing, and to jj^s «' 
these there has now been added the feeling aroused by the atrocities 
(of wliich all the Balkan nations were guilty) during the Second Balkan 
War and the World War. The Macedonians flee from the Greeks 
in western Thrace, while the Jews and Armenians remain in order 
to profit by the new trade that Greek immigration into the area will 
create. The Turks, who form the largest element of the population, 
may wish to go into the new state of Constantinople or even into Asia, 
where they may come under French or British tutelage. 

If the pohtical boundaries have been drawn reasonably close to 
the ethnic boundaries, such a movement of population wiU have a 
wholesome effect. It will put people of the same race and rehgion 
under a conmaon flag ; it will prevent the starting of the irredentist 
movements that arise in islands and peninsulas of people separated 
from their kinsmen across an international boundary. The extraordi- 
nary hatred of one people for another throughout central Europe will 
be lessened only if the processes of migration are added to a strong 
economic revival. Hatreds are difiicult to maintain in the face of 
profitable trade. Unless tendencies mitigating hatred are cultivated, 
the minorities treaties wiU be worthless ; if natural tendencies towards 
friendship can be created, the minorities treaties will become obsolete. 

There promises to be carried out in the Balkans an experiment Treaty for 
in *the transfer of peoples which will be of great practical interest Jer 0!^*^^ 
as a means of reducing the problems of irredentism. By a treaty peoples 
between Greece and Bulgaria (1919), provision is made for the re- 
ciprocal and voluntary migration of ethnic, religious, and linguistic 
minorities. This will enable Greeks Hving in Bulgaria, who desire 
to move into Greece, to do so under favorable conditions ; and the 
same opportunity wiU be given to Bulgarians living in Greece, who 
desire to return to Bulgaria. It has frequently been suggested that 
such an expedient would greatly diminish persecutions and promote 
harmony by allowing people to leave a state whose laws and customs 
were irksome or whose treatment of them seemed hard. 



CHAPTER SEVENTEEN 



The un- 
ruly moun- 
taineers of 
Albania 



Italy's 
long-stand- 
ing desire 
to annex 
Albania 



THE ALBANIAN MOUNTAINEERS 

Of all the unruly elements in the Turkish Empire there were few 
that gave so much trouble as the Albanians. One military expedi- 
tion after another had to be sent out to punish disorderly bands. 
Though Albania is only a little larger than the state of Vermont 
and has hardly a million people, it is a Balkan storm center from which 
grave issues may arise. The Lake Scutari region on the northern 
frontier is a problem area where conflicting interests cannot be 
reconciled save by a long process of negotiation and adjustment. 

It will be seen from Figure 131 that Albania is just opposite the 
heel of the Italian boot. If the Adriatic is to be in truth an Itahan 
lake, Italy will be vitally interested in Albania ; in a similar case the 
United States declared in 1898, and has since maintained, that the 
affairs of Cuba are of vital concern to her, Cuba being a small and 
relatively weak country only a hundred miles from Florida. Albania 
is about half this distance, or forty-five miles, from Italy. 



Distribu- 
tion of 
people in 
Albania 



Custom of 
the feud 
between 
clans 



THE CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY 

Albania is a country of mountains, deep-cut by streams that flow 
out to the Adriatic. There are settled populations in the valleys and 
about the ports. The narrow seacoast plains and deltas, while 
fertile, are unhealthful and thinly inhabited. The greater part of the 
country is occupied by shepherds who are in general of unsettled 
habits, migrating from place to place and preserving the traditions 
and customs of the past. 

Albania has few roads and almost no railroads. Her people, on 
account of the broken character of the relief, live in isolated groups ; 
and the unit of organized hfe is the clan, which exhibits a spirit of 
local independence. Like some other mountain peoples, the 'Al- 
banians have perpetuated the ancient custom of the feud. The 
processes of law are too slow and impersonal for the impatient habit 
of thought and freedom of spirit of men who enjoy the unrestrained 
life and open ways of the mountains. In their view, guilt is personal 
and punishment must be equally so, and it must be swift and hot. 
The trouble with the feud, here as elsewhere, lies in the never-ending 
chain of murders to which members of opposing tribes are committed by 
a system that has no place for the deliberate work of a jury. One can 
but admire the type of bravery which these mountain people exhibit. 
They have never stopped to soliloquize about honor. Whether it 

306 



The Albanian Mountaineers 



307 



was a wrong done by a 
man from a neighbor- 
ing clan or whether it 
was the exactions of 
the taxgatherer, they 
went to the extremity 
of physical danger to 
defend their rights as 
they saw them. 

Ruling men such as 
these, the Turk made 
poor progress in his 
nearly five hundred 
years of control ; for, in 
spite of the fact that 
the Albanians are com- 
posed of Mohamme- 
dans chiefly, their alle- 
giance to the Turkish 
rule was no stronger 
than that of the Kurds 
in eastern Turkey (Fig. 
216), another lawless 
element inhabiting a 
mountainous country. 
It is only a nominal ad- 
herence that they have 
given to the Moslem 
faith. And many strong 
tribes and influential 
modern leaders are 
Christians and have op- 
posed Turkish rule and promoted interest in a national Albanian 
program. Let us see what progress in settling the Albanian question 
the other powers have made since 1913. 




-—Proposed by Balkan jji 

Allies, 1913 
>„„Froposed byAustria 

and ltaly.1913 
^Proposed byAlbanian 

Provisional Gov* 19135 
_._Fixed by the London 

Conference 



Fig. 



154. Various proposed boundaries of Albania, 
a map in the Geographical Review, April 1918. 



After 



INTERNATIONAL ASPECTS OF THE ALBANIAN QUESTION 

At the close of the First Balkan War, the Turkish possessions in Dictum of 
Europe were divided and taken over by the Balkan states, except po^ershi 
for two areas (treaty of London, May 1913^ : ^^13 

^To be distinguished from the secret treaty of London of 1915 (page 263). 



308 



The New World 



Serbian and 
Austrian 
rivalry in 
Albania 



Austrian 
fear of a 
Serb ris- 
ing north 
of the 
Danube 



Proposed 
boundaries 
of Albania 
in 1913 



William of 
Wied for a 
short time 
ruler of 
Albania 



(1) From the Enos-Midia line (Fig. 150) to the Straits, Turkey 
was still to have sovereign rights. 

(2) The ill-defined region known as Albania was to have its bound- 
aries and status determined by the great powers. 

The second of these two decisions was taken at the insistence of the 
great powers, who were influenced by Austria's demand that she 
be freed from the menace of Russian intrigue on the Adriatic. This 
she feared if Serbia (a Slav state backed by Russia) were to gain ac- 
cess to the Adriatic by absorbing Albania. Now the possibility of 
acquiring at least a part of Albania was precisely one of the considera- 
tions that had tempted Serbia to join Bulgaria and Greece in the First 
Balkan War for the overthrow of Turkish power in Europe. She 
was landlocked, and she wanted a window on the Adriatic or on the 
i^gean (Saloniki). The dream of a Jugo-Slav state, with Dalmatia 
and Montenegro to furnish the desired outlet, had not then attained 
the shape of reality. 

Austria-Hungary was the more anxious to keep Serbia small and 
weak because she had milhons of Jugo-Slavs within her frontiers, and 
their restlessness had time and again given the Austrian rulers grave 
anxiety. Should they develop the war spirit of their victorious 
countrymen in Serbia, they might menace the integrity of the poly- 
glot Austro-Hungarian Empire. The other great powers confirmed 
Austria-Hungary in her position and kept Serbia out of Albania and 
the Dalmatian region. Thus they furnished Serbia with an additional 
reason for embarking on the Second Balkan War. 

As for Albania, her vague frontiers were never defined by the suc- 
cessive powers that dealt with her. Various proposals are shown in 
Figure 154. The line fixed by the London Conference of 1913 was 
accepted by aU, except the Albanians themselves, as marking the 
limits of national sovereignty. The limits were highly artificial, 
cutting not only lines of economic intercourse but also tribal ties, the 
strongest bond in the primitive society of Albania. 

WiUiam of Wied, a German prince, was placed on the newly es- 
tabhshed throne of Albania (1913). Wlien the war began in 
1914, both throne and monarch disappeared, and Albania reverted 
to a condition of local government. Northern and central Albania 
were overrun by the Austrian armies, which for four years held a 
mihtary fine a httle north of Valona. In 1918 the Alhed armies 
in the Balkans advanced, and Albania was re-won. 

By a secret treaty made between France, Great Britain, and Italy 
just before Italy entered the World War, the great powers planned 



The Albanian Mountaineers 



309 



to divide Albania, giving the north- 
ern part to Montenegro or to Jugo- 
slavia (treaty of London, 1915). 
The central section was to become 
a self-governing Mohammedan 
state. The southern section, with 
Valona, was to become Italian ter- 
ritory. In June 1917 Italy de- 
clared a protectorate over Albania, 
and assumed that the Alhes ap- 
proved her remaining there. 

The Albanian national leaders 
charged that directly after the 
armistice of 1918, Italy sought by 
forcible colonization and the in- 
troduction of Italian schools to 
Italianize southern Albania. It is 
difficult for Albania to contest the 
acts of her neighbors, because she 
is not united. Her political in- 
stitutions are elementary and weak ; 
she has no railroads to knit the 
country into a unit; there is no 
really strong national feehng on the 
part of the majority of the people ; 
her position tempts stronger neigh- 
bors to covet her land and ports. 

For a long time Italy insisted 

that in anv rasp «ihp Tnn«it liavp a ^^*^- ^^^- Schematic representation of pro- 

inai m any case Sne must nave a posed division of Albania according to the secret 

naval base at the port of Valona treaty of London, 1915, between Italy, Great 

, rv^ • 1 1 • Britain, France, and Russia. 

and a sumciently large protecting 

zone for land operations in case of attack. This would assure her 
naval supremacy in the Adriatic and protect her entire eastern 
coast, a highly important matter when we reaHze that she is singu- 
larly exposed to attack by sea and has the densest population of 
any Mediterranean state (Fig. 67). In the face of a strong land 
attack by Albanian forces, Italy withdrew from Valona in the summer 
of 1920. The Albanians were stirred to action by the behef that 
Italy had agreed to approve the cession of southern Albania to Greece 
and was on the verge of securing an Albanian mandate from the 
great powers. 




First plan 
— to di- 
vide Al- 
bania 



Albania 
not well 
organized 
to oppose 
foreign 
control 



Italian de- 
sire for 
mandate 
over 
Albania 



310 



The New World 




I Jugo-Slavs, ZVIachs, 3 Turks 



Centers of 
Albanian 
interest 
and oppo- 
sition 



Fig. 156. Albanian ethnography, religions, and 
boundaries. For a key to the numbers, see the panel 
at the bottom of the map. The region north of the 
Shkumbi Riveristhemoret>Tically Albanian. Greek 
sentiment prevails at Argyrocastro and Albanian 
sentiment at Koritsa and Valona. Note that all the 
principal towns, of which Scutari is the largest, lie 
near the border of the country and have been occu- 
pied one after another by foreign powers most of the 
time since the First Balkan War (1912), despite the 
fact that Albania won its independence from Turkey 
in 1912. The effect has been to prevent the people 
from taking united action on national questions. 
See Figure 129 for a relief map of the Balkans. 



THE PEOPLE OF ALBANIA 

The northern Albanians are 
distributed along the valley 
floors tributary to Lake Scutari, 
and about the lake border 
itself. South and east of these 
groups are the true moun- 
taineers, the most primitive of 
all, a pastoral people of rude 
Hfe and custom. Still farther 
south are bands of population 
along the valleys, separated 
from each other by high and 
steep mountain chains with 
few passes. At the southern 
end of the country are good 
agricultural districts with larger 
towns, hke Koritsa. Along the 
eastern margin of the main 
Albanian mountain mass are 
broad, rich valleys where out- 
liers of Albanian population 
Uve in large numbers, as for 
example, Uskiib, Prizren, and 
Oklirida. 

The people of southern Al- 
bania have many resemblances 
to the Greeks. In the neigh- 
borhood of Argyrocastro there 
is a strong pro-Greek feeUng, 
on account of Greek schools ; 
but north of this region again 
the Albanian national spirit is 
strong and hatred of the Greeks 
intense. The town of Koritsa 
is Albanian, and so is the ter- 
ritory around it. 

In northern Albania the 
mountain people depend upon 
the market towns for a great 
many of their life needs, and 



Tlie Albanian Mountaineers 



311 




Fig. 157. Part of the town of Koritsa, southern Albania. 

these market towns, with the exception of Scutari, are in Serbian or 
Montenegrin territory. The result is that in mountain communities, 
far from Scutari, there is almost general scarcity of the products of 
the towns. Everywhere the frontiers are practically closed, and there 
is almost complete stagnation of economic life. 

The Ufe of the Albanian mountaineer has been unsettled by long Prevalence 
military occupation. Patrols of Albanians and Serbs were obliged and'brig- 
to guard almost aU the roads in 1919-1920, after the Itahan and andage 
French forces of occupation had gone. No one could travel in 
Albania without an armed guard, and bands of mountaineers com- 
mitted atrocities in many sections. The general unrest was fostered 
by Serbian conscription in areas of Albanian population included 
within the Jugo-Slav frontiers. 



THE PROSPECT FOR UNITED ALBANIA 

In the meantime Albanian leaders are working for the union of the Present plan 
Albanian people into one state, and their efforts have resulted in °^ ^^°° 
admission to the League of Nations and a recognition of independence. 
A provisional government has made a prehminary agreement with 
Italy which leaves the latter in possession of the peninsulas on either 
side of the harbor of Valona and of the islands that guard the 
approaches, but releases the town and port to Albania. Italy also 



312 Tlie New World 

obtains recognition of her paramount political interest in Albanian 
affairs as part of her general program of Adriatic defense. It will 
be important to have the final boundaries of Albania carefully drawn, 
so as to bring about union, as far as possible, of aU Albanians directly 
connected with the main body, and ensure economic prosperity, 
which forms one of the bases of enduring peace. However, the pro- 
cess of making a unified state will be doubly difficult in a land with 
almost no railroads, few newspapers, and a high degree of illiteracy. 
Also opposed to the unifying processes are the rivalries of bordering 
states — Greece, Jugo-Slavia, and Italy. If in furthering their com- 
mercial interests these states employ the traditional forms of pohtical 
propaganda, there may ensue disorder, if not disaster. 



1 



CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 

THE REUNITED GREEK LANDS 

There are three salient periods of development in Greek history to 
which attention may be directed for an understanding of the modern 
Greek program and the new boundaries of Greece : 

(1) The early period of Greek settlement on the shores of the 
Mediterranean. 

(2) The revival of Greek national feeling that led to the war of 
independence (1820 to 1829). 

(3) The territorial growth of the immediate past" (1912 to 1920) that 
has culminated in the Greece of today. 

The first period spanned a space of many centuries, until Greek col- 
onies were estabhshed along the thousands of miles of coast from the 
Pillars of Hercules (Gibraltar) to the eastern end of the Black Sea. 
By the 8th century b.c. the Greek people occupied an area far greater 
than Greece itself, and some of the larger and earher settlements, 
particularly on the JEgean, "were ready to send out colonies in com- 
petition with those of the parent land." 

The motive for emigration was at first the pressure of population Rise of 
in Greece. Later the Greeks invaded the Phoenician trading areas, ^^^^^ . , 

. . o ' commercial 

their pirates preying upon the commerce of the Phoenicians. A spirit andpouti- 
of adventure, travel, and foreign settlement marked the rise of Greek *^*^ ^"^^"^ 
power upon the sea. It was natural that conquest should go hand in 
hand with the development of this power, and at length in Alexan- 
der's time (331 b.c.) effective Greek control was extended as far as the 
Euphrates, which for many centuries was to mark the line between 
the enterprising, virile peoples of the west and the more static oriental 
culture of Asia. 

The maritime traditions of the Greeks, their skill as traders, their 
occupation of the entire ^gean realm, their distribution throughout 
the Mediterranean and Black Sea basins as merchants and carriers, 
their hold upon the commercial outlets of the lands tributary to these 
basins, their settlement in patches and fringes of population on the 
seacoasts of lands inhabited by non-Greek peoples — all these factors 
converge upon the problems of the moment and render the tracing 
of Greek boundaries exceedingly difficult if justice is to be done to 
the nations that border Greece in the Near East. 

313 



314 



The New World 



Rise of the 
city-state 



Change in 
ethnic 
character 
of Greeks 




Fig. 158. The map embraces the whole field of Greek territorial claims. For detailed bounda- 
ries in the Smyrna and Constantinople districts see Figures 161 and 207. The Armenian 
boundary southwest of Trebizond is subject to modifications in detail. The cession of the 
Dodecanese to Greece by Italy (excepting Rhodes, which Italy retains) was by treaty between 
Italy and Greece, but with general Allied sanction. With " Boundaries granted by the Peace 
Conference " in the legend are grouped present de facto boundaries such as the Albano-Greek 
and Serbo-Greek boundaries. 

Hand in hand with the rise of Greek power there went the develop- 
ment of the city-state, the first great milestone in the progress of 
liberal government. Attica became the symbol of democracy, and 
though it was but a seed that was planted there, the fruit eventually 
borne contributed to the poUtical life and institutions of democratic 
governments everywhere throughout the world. 

We shall not attempt to trace in detail the fortunes of the Greek 
people in the period of their long eclipse. In modified (Byzantine) 
form Greek civihzation survived during the interval between the con- 
quest of Greece by the Romans in 146 b.c. and the ultimate winning 
of Greek independence in 1829 (the treaty of Adrianople). At least in 
name, Constantinople was a Greek city for a thousand years. Here the 
Greek Orthodox Church took its rise, and from this and other centers 
of Greek life and culture there radiated the power of Greek ideals in 
literature, art, and government that for centuries profoundly affected 
the Roman world ; some of its impulses are felt even in the life and 
institutions of our own time. Yet in the long centuries of eclipse, 
profound changes were to affect the Greek people. The racial 
character itself was ethnically altered. Strong Slavic infusions took 
place. The genius of the people declined. Many of the modern 
Greeks, including even those who live within sight of the Acropohs, 
are ignorant of the noblest traditions of Greek life. In place of the 



The Reunited Greek Lands 315 

odysseys of ancient Greece, we have in modern times the sordid tale 
of petty trading and bartering in the ports of the Near Eastern world. 

In spite of the Greek dechne, there are two quahties that stand out independ- 
with striking prominence. The first is the capacity of the Greek to ^eJJs^ent 
absorb the people who invade his latids. The invader, whether it was aim 
Albanian or Slav, who penetrated the Greek peninsula, came to have 
something more than a veneer of Hellenic culture ; for it is difficult 
to resist assimilation into a mode of hfe, a regional spirit, as distinc- 
tive as that of the Hellenic lands. Something of this regional spirit 
may be at the bottom of the second quahty — the tenacity shown in 
never-fading desire for independence and the reunion of Greek lands, 
at least about the borders of the ^gean. Doubtless there could more 
than once have been a realization of this aim if the Greeks had not 
lacked that vital thing necessary to national power and welfare — the 
unity of its people. Just as the city-states fell to quarreling with each 
other (for example, in the Peloponnesian War of 431-404 B.C.) and 
.finally almost extinguished their nationeJ inheritance, so in the later 
history of Greece rival chieftains and the leaders of opposing factions 
have harmed Greece as much as has the outsider. 

Finally, through the bitter lessons of Turkish rule, from 1456 down Greek war 
to 1829, Greek leaders were taught the necessity of working for a com- peidence 
mon purpose, and in the Greek war of independence at last achieved 
freedom from the Turk. The history of Greece from that time for- 
ward is marked by almost incessant internal disorder and by the 
practical overlordship of the great powers of western Europe. To 
mention only one episode in her foreign relations, the war with Turkey 
in 1897 brought upon Greece a heavy indemnity of $20,000,000 ; and 
in addition she was forced to submit to a loss of territory on her 
northern frontier. 

At the outbreak of war in 1914, the pro-German sympathies of 
King Constantine, who had married a sister of Emperor William of 
Germany, led to a long internal struggle, ending in 1917 with the 
flight of the king and the elevation to leadership of Venizelos, one of 
the most remarkable men of modern Europe. Thereafter Greece 
fought on the side of the Allies, and though her total war effort in 
1917-1918 amounted to but httle, she had participated heartily in the 
Balkan War of 1912 by which Turkey was all but ousted from Europe. 
She had stiU further extended her territory, at the expense of Bul- 
garia, in the Second Balkan War, and in 1914 her frontier stood as 
represented in Figure 150. Late in 1920, as the result of popular vote, 
the government of Venizelos fell. Constantine returned to the Greek 



316 



The New World 



Macedonia 
a transition 
region 



A theater 
of political 
propaganda 



throne, but it cannot yet be said whether this means a repudiation of 
the Venizelos program. 

In the new settlement of the Balkans and the Near East it was the 
Greek plan to lay claim to the most important Greek lands in the 
Near Eastern realm. These we shall now discuss in detail in the 
following order : Macedonia, Thrace, the Dodecanese, Smyrna, Epirus, 
Trebizond, Cyprus. 

THE DIVISION OF MACEDONIA 

Macedonia under Alexander became the heart of a great empire, 
and some measure of its greatness was retained by the country until 
the Turkish invasion of the 14th century, when, in common with 
other Balkan lands, it became a part of the Turkish Empire. With 
the revival of nationalities in the Balkans, particularly in the 19th 
century, the Macedonian question in its modern aspect took form. 

The region has always had indefinite boundaries. It reaches the 
sea at Saloniki on the south, extends westward to Lake Okhrida and 
the Albanian frontier, merges almost insensibly on the east into Bul- 
garian territory in the Strumitsa region, and on the north reaches as 
far as Uskiib. Within these limits the population may be estimated 
around 2,000,000, of whom more than half are Christians and the rest 
chiefly Mohammedans, with some Jews in the towns, notably at 
Saloniki. In population as in position the region is a transition land. 
The language has quaUties that resemble both Bulgarian and Serbian. 
Church membership in many cases classifies a man "racially." From 
Figure 159 it wiU be seen that Macedonia lies at the meeting place 
of three Balkan states, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Greece, and it was 
natural that each of these states should make an effort to impose its 
culture upon the people and develop a nationalist sentiment among 
them. Bulgarian claims rested upon one-time possession of the 
region and the racial character of the people. But the Serbs also 
held the country for a time and left a deep impress there, for exam- 
ple, in architecture and literature. 

The chief media of propaganda were the school and the church. 
Until her wars for independence early in the 19th century, Greece 
led in influence because of the strength of her church organization and 
her superior culture. Her hold was all the stronger because she oper- 
ated chiefly in the towns, where powerful Greek merchants lived, and 
the towns in turn greatly influenced the country districts tributary to 
them. Even Bumania joined in the e.ff'ort to penetrate Macedonia 
and win adherence to her program of national expansion. This she 



The Reunited Greek Lands 



S17 




\Area inhabited by 
Bulgarians according 
to Ischerl^off. 

■ Western limit of area 
inhabited by Bulgarians 
according to Cvijic. 

• Limit of area inhabited 
by Macedonian SI a vs 
according to Cvijic. 



Fig. 159. Conflicting views on ethnography of the Macedonian region by a Bulgarian, Ischerkoff 
{Petermanns Mitteilungen, 1915, PI. 44), and a Serbian, Cvijic {Repori of the Inkrnational Com- 
mission to Inquire into the Causes and Conduct of the Balkan Wars, Carnegie Endowment for 
International Peace, 1915). Existing international boundaries are shown by heavy dash-and-dot 
lines. 



was able to do because of the presence of Vlachs in large numbers — 
probably between 75,000 and 100,000 in all in the Macedonian coun- 
try (Fig. 145). In the struggle for supremacy Bulgaria was favored 
by the establishment of the Exarchist, or Bulgarian, church in 1870 
by Turkish authority. The Exarch was head of the church and was 
able to further Bulgarian interests by impressing upon all members 
of his church the national, or Bulgarian, character of their religion. 

By the secret alUance between Serbia and Bulgaria before the First Macedonia 
Balkan War a detailed line was agreed upon, beyond which Serbia was 
"to formulate no territorial claim," and a contested zone which ex- 
tended westward far enough to include tjskiib and Dibra was reserved 
for arbitration by the Czar of Russia (Fig. 150). But Bulgaria made 
unexpected gains in eastern Thrace, and the powers decided to form 
an independent Albania in the regions where Serbia had hoped to 
increase her territory. Wherefore Serbia denounced the territorial 



in relation 
to the Sec- 
ond Balkan 
War 



318 



The New World 



Present 
state of the 
Macedonian 
question 



terms of the alliance, and the Second Balkan War resulted. With 
the complete success of Serbia and Greece they divided the country 
as shown in Figure 150. Serbia obtained still more territory by the 
treaty of peace with Bulgaria which followed the World War, whereby 
the Strumitsa salient, with other bits of territory, was ceded to her 
(that is, to Jugo-Slavia). The local disarrangement of life which this 
brought about was very serious. Macedonians in large numbers had 
emigrated from Serbian territory into the Strumitsa salient at the 
close of the Balkan wars, and with the cession of this territory to 
Jugo-Slavia they have again been required to move. 

The Macedonian question, once the chief political problem of the 
Near East, has passed into an entirely new phase. Neither Greece 
nor Serbia is expected to give up Macedonian territory for a possible 
future Macedonia. The Macedonians are without leaders of real 
ability, and the heterogeneous character of the population makes it 
impossible for them to have or to express a common public opinon. 
There are no significant resources. It is a poor country, largely de- 
forested and partly desolate, and will always be commercially tributary 
to communities that are richer and economically better balanced. 
It is therefore improbable that the Macedonian question will be re- 
vived except through the possible cruelties of Greeks and Serbs in 
their treatment of the Macedonians, a danger of the kind which it 
was the chief purpose of the minorities treaties to avoid. 



Distribu- 
tion of 
Greeks in 
Thrace 



THE QUESTION OF THRACE 

An extension of her eastern frontier in Thrace as far as the Black 
Sea gives Greece control of the entire southern littoral of the Balkan 
peninsula, and with this acquisition go commercial advantages of 
peculiar interest to a seafaring and trading population Uke the Greeks. 
In support of her claim to this important strip of territory Greece 
pointed to the thousand years of control of Constantinople by the 
Greek or Byzantine Empire, and to the large number of Greek people 
in eastern and western Thrace, who would have numbered still more 
had it not been for the massacres by Turks and Bulgarians in the 
Balkan wars and in the recent World War itself. An ethnic map 
of the region is difficult to construct because of the unequal character 
of the statistics and the lack of any statistics at all for important 
places. This much is surely known, that the two principal towns, 
Adrianople and Kirk Kilisse, are chiefly Greek and that in the region 
as a whole Greeks outnumber Turks. Bulgarians form the third of 
the three principal ethnic groups. The mixture of populations is 



The Reunited Greek Lands 



319 




320 



The New World 



Greek 
acquisition 
of Thrace 



Restric- 
tions and 
obligations 



due to the historical character of Thrace as a transition region between 
Turkish and Balkan peoples. The problem was further confused by 
the effect of the two Balkan wars and the World War, which displaced 
or destroyed whole sections of the population. Before 1912 the Greeks 
in eastern Thrace (east of the Maritsa) numbered 400,000 as against 
250,000 Turks and 50,000 Bulgarians. According to Greek estimates 
western Thrace had a population of 400,000, of whom 70,000 only 
were Greeks, 59,000 Bulgarians, and 285,000 Turks. Bulgarian fig- 
ures ascribe 185,000 Bulgarians to the region and only 32,000 Greeks. 

In laying claim to the whole of Thrace, Greece had the powerful 
argument that if any portion of the coast bordering the ^Egean 
were left in the hands of Bulgaria or Turkey, the harbors of that 
coast would furnish bases for submarine attacks upon the long coast 
line of Greece. By the terms of the Turkish and Bulgarian treaties 
she wins aU the territory of eastern and western Thrace except a small 
area at Constantinople, though a coastal strip on the sea of Marmara 
is to be under Allied control (Fig. 158). 

By acquiring Thrace, Greece has achieved the principal part of her 
program of the reunion of Greek lands. She is restricted, however, 
in three important matters : 

(1) She must guarantee Bulgaria freedom of transit to the i^gean 
through Thrace. 

(2) The Maritsa is to be constituted an international river upon 
application to the League of Nations of the states bordering 
that river, — that is, of Bulgaria and Greece. 

(3) She undertakes to protect minority populations, especially at 
Adrianople, where the racial elements are to have representa- 
tion in the local govermnent according to a scheme prepared 
l)y Greece. 

It is further provided, on account of the large number of Turks 
in Thrace and the large number of Greeks on the southern shore of 
the Black Sea and elsewhere under Turkish sovereignty, that Greece 
and Turkey may negotiate for the reciprocal exchange of their 
nationals. 

THE DODECANESE AND' OTHER ISLANDS OF THE yEGEAN 

Italian When she secured liberation from Turkish rule in 1829, Greece 

occupation acquired only a portion of her national territory. An important part 
of her population is located in a group of islands off the coast of Ana- 
tolia and south of Smyrna, known as the Dodecanese. The popu- 



The Reunited Greek Lands 321 

lation comprises 100,000 Greeks as compared with 12,000 persons of 
other nationalities. By the terms of the treaty of Lausanne, which 
closed the Italo-Turkish War, the islands were to be occupied by 
Italy until Turkey had withdrawn officers, troops, and officials from 
Libya. Before these agreements had been completed the World War 
broke out, and in the peace settlement of 1920 with Turkey the 
Dodecanese were ceded to Italy; but at the same time Italy and 
Greece signed a separate treaty transferring the islands to Greece. 
Rhodes alone was retained by Italy, though a qualified plebiscite is 
provided for at the end of five years (page 326). 

Commercially the islands are not important. They have little Possible 
arable ground, no industries of importance, and no maritime activity "^sion to 
except some sponge fishing. Conditions of life are distinctly hard. 
But the islands do form an important base for the commercial pene- 
tration of Anatolia. 

As a result of the Balkan wars, Greece had already received Greek 
Lemnos, Samothrace, Mytilene, Samos, Nikaria, and Chios, in addi- fhl^^'^ean 
tion to other smaller islands in the ^^gean. She now receives Imbros islands 
and Tenedos. The total area of these islands is somewhat less than 
2000 square miles, and they have a population of about 325,000, of 
whom 90 per cent are Greek. The islands are of moderate commer- 
cial importance. 

THE SMYRNA REGION 

Among outlying territories it is the Smyrna region that is of chief The Greeks 
interest to Greece, for here live about 500,000 Greeks in an area but °^ Smyrna 
little larger than the state of Connecticut. The city of Smyrna has 
375,000 people and is now the largest city in the Greek world, Athens 
having but 168,000. Ever since the coming of the Turk (early 15th 
century), these Greeks have been under the government of an alien 
conquering race. During the World War they were badly treated, 
and during the period of peace-making they were alleged to be in 
serious danger of massacre by Turkish troops. 

To save the Greek population from possible attacks by the Turksi Greek occu- 
the Allies permitted Greece to land troops at Smyrna and occupy the sm' m^^ 
adjacent district. Allied warships were present to take part in the compiica- 
operations if necessary, an action that was complicated by the pres- th^itaHans 
ence of the Italians inomediately to the south. Unauthorized by the *° ^® ^"*^ 
Peace Conference at Paris — in fact, in the face of its direct protests 
— the Itahans landed troops in the Adalia region on the pretext of 
protecting their interests. As a matter of fact, they have no inter- 



322 



The New World 



Greek 
claim to 
the region 



S MYRN A 

—New boundaries 






ests there worthy of 
mention. Clashes oc- 
curred between Greek 
and Itahan troops, and 
finally (July 1919) the 
peace conference sent a 
military mission to 
Smyrna to establish the 
limits of the Greek and 
Italian military occu- 
pations. 

The Greeks are a 
coast and island people. 
The yEgean is their 
sea historically. The 
Trojan War was prima- 
rily an issue of the 
Greek need — a need 
still existing — for free 
access to the grain 
lands of the Black Sea. In the Smyrna region Greeks have been set- 
tled for thousands of years. With the city and the region adjacent 
to it is associated a great deal of Greek history and tradition, and it 
has long been a trade focus. Greek traders here met the laden cara- 
vans that every year journeyed out of Inner Asia across the wastes 
of Persia and the Syrian desert with the rich spices, teas, silks, and 
jewelry of the East. Camel caravans may still be seen, but now a 
railway connects Smyrna with inland towns that may grow to be 
important cities under a reorganized Turkish government. 

As the outlet for a large part of western Anatoha, Smyrna is a 
conmiercial prize. In 1914- the chief exports were : 




Accordind to f ' ^^^ Greeks outnumber Turks 
Greek statistics ^^^ •- number 50% of Turks 

E>EvZ3 „ . 25% . „ 



Fig. 161. Map of the Smyrna region, showing the ethnic basis 
of Greek claims according to Greek statistics. 



Tobacco $1,380,000 



Opium .... 

Figs 

Licorice root 
Carpets and rugs 
Emery stone . . 
Skins .... 



1,365.000 
700,000 
460,000 
400,000 
280,000 
233,000 



Valonia $208,000 

Olive oil 148,000 

Raisins 80,000 

Wool 20,000 

Walnuts 17,000 

Peas 17,000 

Preserves 14,000 



The table shows that Smyrna is the port not only for the district 
immediately around it, but for the far interior as well. The products 
of the desert, where a certain amount of grazing is possible, the prod- 



The Reunited Greek Lands 



323 




A 
■a 

I 

I 

-2 
"ft 
o 
d 



o3 _^ 
$ a 



T3 ^ 



g 03 



to t: 
.2 ft 



a 



324 The New World 

ucts of the irrigated oases at the borders of the desert, as well as 
the products of the farms and orchards in the mountain valleys that 
face the sea behind Smyrna — all find their outlet through this, the 
greatest of Turkish ports except Constantinople. 

Some statesmen think that Greek control of Smyrna would have 
the advantage of combining the principal Greek element in the eastern 
Mediterranean with the home country, and of strengthening the 
Greek nation. Others contend that it would be unfair, as it would 
so weaken Turkey as practically to destroy her economic life. 

According to the terms of the Turkish treaty (still unratified), 
the management by Greece of the Smyrna region (Fig. 161) is to 
follow the lines indicated in the following summary : 

(1) Turkey keeps her sovereignty over the region, but transfers 
her "rights of sovereignty " to Greece, who may maintain the 
mihtary force necessary to keep order, though compulsory mili- 
tary service is forbidden. 

(2) The ports, railways, and waterways of the region are included 
within the regime for European waterways provided by the 
earlier treaties of 1919-1920 between the AlUes and the Central 
Powers. 

(3) Greek, customs are to be collected on the frontiers of the region. 

(4) Greece is to provide diplomatic and consular protection for 
Turkish nationals from the Smyrna region abroad. 

(5) A local parliament is constituted, including representatives of 
all races. The principles of the Greek constitution are to 
govern the relations of this parhament to the Greek adminis- 
tration. 

(6) The final status of the region is not determined. In 1925 
the local parhament may ask the League of Nations to per- 
mit the union of the region to Greece, in which case the Coun- 
cil of the League may require a plebiscite. 

(7) Turkey is to have a customs zone at Smyrna, in which she is 
to enjoy full freedom of commerce without paying customs 
dues. 

NORTHERN EPIRUS 

Northern Epirus (southern Albania) has a population estimated to 
number between 250,000 and 300,000. It is equally divided between 
members of the Greek Orthodox Church and Mohammedans, the 
former speaking Albanian, but presumably having Greek sympathies. 



The Remitted Greek Lands 



325 





Fig. 163. A laden camel caravan marching toward Smyrna from the interior of Anatolia; 



For a time just before the war, the Albanian Greek Orthodox people 
of Epirus proclaimed themselves an autonomous state, and estab- 
lished a provisional government at Argyrocastro. In 1914 "sacred 
battalions," said to have been composed in part of Greek citizens, 
ravaged the country of the Albanian Moslems and massacred or drove 
out a great many people, at the same time destroying their villages. 
Twenty thousand people fled into the Valona region. At the Confer- 
ence of Corfu in May 1914, the Albanian government and the great 
powers agreed upon a separate government for northern Epirus. 

Albanians violently oppose the Greek claims to northern Epirus. 
Their arguments are similar to those advanced in so many other 
disputed regions of Europe. The people of the region speak 
Albanian, and nearly half are Mohammedan in religion. Koritsa, 
the most important town in the disputed zone, is a center of Albanian 
nationalist influence. The schools are almost exclusively Greek, and 
Greek culture and economic influence are dominant. The sentiment 
of the Albanian population here, as elsewhere, is very difiicult to esti- 
mate. It has had no practice in free voting and has always been dis- 
tracted by the propagandist agents of neighboring powers. 

The disposition of the northern Epirus region long awaited the 
settlement of the Albanian question. Now that Jugo-Slavia and Italy 
have come to an agreement that does not include Greece, Greek claims 
in southern Albania have little importance. The return of Con- 
stantine to the Greek throne has also diminished Allied support of 



Albanian 
view of 
Greek 
control 



326 The New World 

Greece. Moreover, Albania has won recognition as an independent 
state from the League of Nations, and as such she is now probably 
secure from selfish territorial encroachment. 

TREBIZOND 

The strip of Greek population along the southern shore of the 
Black Sea that includes the city of Trebizond numbers 350,000, but 
it is far from the central portion of the Greek world. For these 
reasons the Greek desire to have a zone of influence there met with 
no support from the treaty makers at Paris in 1919. The only ad- 
vantage that has been won for these people is their protection as a 
minority population, partly within the new Turkish state and partly 
within the new Armenia. 

CYPRUS 

Great Britain "occupied" Cyprus from 1878 on, according to an 
agreement of that year whereby she should remain in Cyprus as long 
as Russia occupied the Transcaucasian provinces of Kars, Batum, 
and Ardahan, which she had taken from Turkey. Though Cyprus is 
Greek in population, it forms a link in the British strategic chain. On 
5 November 1914 the British government annexed the island, and 
this action was confirmed by all the interested powers in the Turkish 
treaty of 1920. Finally, Article 3 of the Franco-British agreement 
of 23 December 1920 provides that Great Britain shall not cede or 
alienate the island without the previous consent of France. 

Connected with the question of Cyprus is that of Rhodes, held by 
Italy since the Italo-Turkish war of 1911-1912. By treaty with 
Greece (1920) provision is made for a plebiscite in five years. If the 
inhabitants vote for Greece Italy will withdraw, provided Great 
Britain will withdraw from Cyprus. 

THE OUTLOOK FOR GREECE 

As a result of the treaties which closed the two Balkan wars and 
of the terms of the Turkish and Bulgarian treaties and other ar- 
rangements with the Allied powers in 1919 and 1920, Greece has won 
so much territory that her area is now twice what it was in 1911. 
Before the Balkan wars she had a population of 2,700,000. With 
the addition of 1,400,000 in Macedonia, Epirus, and Thrace, some 
hundreds of thousands inhabiting islands now ceded to Greece, and 
about 1,000,000 at Smyrna, her population is about 5,000,000, and 
of the population gained since 1912 about 2,250,000 are Greek. 



The Reunited Greek Lands 327 

With inspiring sea traditions, Greece is now on the way to becoming 
one of the strongest minor powers of Em^ope. At the beginning of 
the World War the tonnage of Greek merchant ships was about 
820,000; that is, in proportion to the population, Greek merchant 
tonnage compared favorably with that of all but four countries. 
Greece has acquired new harbors of great importance to her. Saloniki 
was added in 1912, Dedeagatch and Smyrna in 1920, not to include 
such important inland stations as Adrianople, Kirk Kilisse, etc. This 
advantage is offset in part by shipping losses during the war, which 
have brought her total down to 291,000 tons. 

There is promise of increasing strength in the internal economic 
situation of Greece. In order to stimulate conamerce and industry, as 
well as agriculture and the merchant marine ministries of agriculture 
and shipping have been created in the cabinet of the government. 
Fortunately, there is no troublesome land-tenure question; in late 
years the proportion of small estates has increased rapidly, and pro- 
duction has been stimulated by the formation of cooperative agri- 
cultural societies. 

It is too early to estimate the political and economic effects of 
the return of Constantine to the Greek throne. Certainly it will be 
more difficult for Greece to secure loans from the Allied powers ; and 
Greek participation in the Turkish treaty may be far less favorable 
to her. The Allies have it in their power to embarrass Greece, if 
they wish to do so, by refusing military and moral support when 
clashes occur, as they are bound to, between Greek civil officials and 
troops of occupation on the one hand and minority groups in the 
newly won territories on the other. Whether Allied help will be 
withdrawn is a matter of vital importance to Greece, whose present 
territorial status is almost wholly an Allied creation. 



CHAPTER NINETEEN 



POLAND AND ITS DISPUTED BORDERLANDS 



Among the reconstituted nations of the world there is none other 
that has had so great a past as Poland. The Pohsh realm long 
included Lithuania, and as late as 1740 it extended from the Baltic 
almost to the Black Sea (Fig. 165). At that time it nearly reached 
the Oder on the west ; it passed the main stream of the Dnieper on 
the east. Warsaw was then one of the great capitals of Europe. 
The trade of the Ottoman Empire in part flowed northwestward from 
the Black Sea and the Bosporus through Polish towns. 

During the 12th and 13th centuries Poland was the scene of costly 
civil war, owing to the quarrels of the rival Polish princes. Military 
pressure by Mongols and Prussians further diverted the strength of 
the Polish government. By attaching Lithuania to itself in 1386, 
Poland had increased its territory so greatly that for several centuries 
thereafter it was one of the two or three largest nations of continental 
Europe. But its internal and external difficulties were at last to prove 
fatal. As Prussia advanced on the west, Poland sought to advance 
eastward. It was a great and liistoric mistake, and one which Poland 
appears determined to repeat. Poland does not seem to be able to 
absorb large Russian elements successfully. Within thirty-two years of 
the climax of its power and one hundred and twenty-four years after 
the time of its greatest expansion, Poland suffered the first of the 
divisions known in history as the three partitions of Poland (1772, 
1793, 1795). 

The three partitions of Poland, in which its territory was divided 
by Russia, Prussia, and Austria, left it paralyzed. National pride 
was humiliated. The robber states set up new boundaries that 
completely disregarded the natm^al relations of the region. The 
social and economic life of the people was shaken to its foundation. 
Rivers that once pulsated with life became merely "dead border 
lines." Though revolutionary movements were started in 1831 and 
1863, the latter being suppressed by outrageous cruelties, until 1918 
Polish nationality was hopelessly enchained. 

A review of Poland's problems will show that its situation and 
international relations are matters of vital importance to the future 
stability of Europe. The elements of danger are as great as in the 
Balkans, and most of the available leaders are untried in adminis- 
tration and government. It will strain Poland's intellectual resources 

328 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



329 




Scale 1:17 500000 



Fig. 164. Based on Droysen, Allgemeiner Historischer Handallas, PI. 40. From the Geograph- 
ical Review, Vol. 4, 1917. 

to provide officials of the right kind to manage her complex problems 
of state. Among the historical and geographical elements to which 
attention is here given are the following : 

(1) The geographical position of the country is in the midst of 
a vast plain without natural frontiers eastward toward Russia 
or westward toward Germany. 

(2) Though Slavs, the Poles are Roman Cathohc, whereas the 
Russians are Greek Orthodox and the Germans chiefly 
Protestant. 

(3) Though Slavs, the Poles represent western, as opposed to 
eastern, culture. 

(4) Once a great nation, there would be a natural tendency for 
Poland to wish to include within the present frontiers all of 
its former territory, even if acquired at the expense of neigh- 
boring states. 

(5) The Poles were once divided among three rival powers — 
Russia, Germany, and Austria — and this fact, in part, makes 
them the enemies of their two strongest neiglibors, Germany 
and Russia. 



330 



The New World 




Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 331 

(6) Though a strip of Pohsh population reaches the Baltic, this 
strip is very narrow ; if widened it would be at the expense 
of the Germans, who already have protested at even so nar- 
row a strip as that shown in Figure 171. 

(7) The eastern border of ethnic Poland is ill-defined, and the 
recent growth of Polish population in this region is more rapid 
than anywhere else on the borders of Poland. It follows 
that Polish statesmen desire a new frontier to be estabhshed 
as far east as possible. 

ORGANIZATION OF THE NEW REPUBLIC 

There is a saying that when the white eagle of Poland flies in the The white 
sky, the red eagle of Prussia must come down. But the red eagle was Poland and 
in the sky for a hundred and forty years. Had the Polish people ^^^l^^^ 
not had great tenacity and a long national history, they might this Prussia 
day be divided among neighbors of difl'erent race and speech. But 
throughout the long period of oppression by Russians, Prussians, and 
Austrians they kept alive their national consciousness and pride, and 
despite enormous difficulties organized a central government in 1918. 

Pilsudski became the military leader and provisional president, Two great 
and Paderewski was later appointed president of the council of min- PiisudsW 
isters, or premier. The latter's knowledge of American and English 
character made him a most powerful exponent of Polish affairs at 
the Peace Conference of Paris. The steadying eff'ect of his work 
was of vast benefit to his people. He was threatened by Bolshevism 
outside of Poland and by doubters within; he was confronted by 
almost general want, the lack of money and troops, the absence of 
roUing stock, a threatening horde of Germans on the west, and the 
Ukrainian army in GaHcia on the southeast. 

These difficulties were increased by the extraordinary nature of the 
Polish program. Almost every Polish leader wanted to see the 
greatest possible Poland created, no matter at what expense to the 
neighboring states. Many wished to see even East Prussia included. 
It was taken for granted that Danzig would become a Polish port. 
All of Eastern Galicia was assumed to be naturaUy Polish territory, 
though inhabited chiefly by Ruthenians. No leader could have won 
on such a program before a general congress of European leaders 
striving to adjust rival claims. The best that Poland could do was 



and Pade- 
rewski 



Fig. 165 (upper) . Based on Shepherd, Historical Atlas, PI. 130-131, and Droysen, Allgemeimr 
Hisiorischer Handatlas, PI. 44. 

Fig. 166 (lower). Based on Putzger, Historischer Schul- Atlas zur alten, mittleren und neuen 
Geschichte, PI. 25. Both figures are from the Geographical Review, 1917. 



332 



Tlie New World 



; H 17 





other Nationalities 



Mixed Poles and other Nationalities 
WMM^ Mixed Narionalities other than Polish 



Fig. 167. Ethnography of Poland and its border zones. Eastern Galicia is occupied, but with- 
out treaty confirmation. Poland did not accept the eastern boundary as proposed by the Peace 
Conference of Paris. For the boundary with Soviet Russia see Figure 169. The Allenstein 
and Marienwerder plebiscites have been held, and the vote was almost unanimously for Ger- 
many ; but the powers have yet to delimit a boundary. The division of Silesia will be based 
on a plebiscite held on 20 March 1921. Teschen, Orawa, and Spits have been recommended 
for division between Czecho-Slovakia and Poland by the Council of Ambassadors (Fig. 179). 
Ethnography based on British General Staff ethnic jnap, 1 : 1,500,000, 1918. Key to numerals: 
1, Poles; 2, Germans; 3, Czecho-Slovaks ; 4, Magyars; 5, Rumanians; 6, Ruthenians (Ukrain- 
ians) ; 7, White Russians ; 8, Lithuanians. 



Breach 
between 
Pilsudski 
and Pade- 
rewsld 



far short of her hopes, and the leader of the hour was destined to 
enjoy only a short period of authority. 

Gradually Pilsudski and Paderewski became the heads of opposing 
factions. Paderewski led a party which desired to see a liberal gov- 
ernment developed, and one which should have the good- will of the 
Allies. Pilsudski, a socialist before the war, had now become a sort 
of military dictator who wished to arrange an understanding with 
either Germany or Russia and to free himself from AUied control. 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



333 



100 IM 




POPULATION DENSITY 

per sq km ^persqmi 

under ?'i l l underE4 
2S - 50 1ZZ1G4--I28 

50 - 75 nz}m-m 

75 - 100 ^^ 192-256 
100-200^^256-512 
over 200?^ggover5lZ 

y2_ 



Fig. 168. The Cracow-Czernowitz region of dense population is the eastern end of a belt that 
extends northwestward into Belgium. Notice the lighter grades of density in the region of Brest- 
Litovsk and Grodno, just where the absolute number of Poles is increasing. See inset of Figure 
182. Based on Romer, Atlas geographique et statistique de la Pologne, 1916, PI. 7, supplemented 
by Andree, Handatlas, PI. 30, and Petermanns Mitteilungen, 1913, I, PI. 2. For later boundary 
details see Figures 179 and 180. 

In the ensuing political contest the advantage was all with Pil- 
sudski, who held the reins of power, had the army and the police with 
him, and was supported by prominent groups with imperialistic and 
mihtaristic aims. He gradually won to his favor the political leaders, 
and Paderewski was forced to resign early in 1920, after which h^ 
became Poland's representative at Paris until his retirement in 
January 1921. 

POLAND AND RUSSIA 

The policies of Pilsudski were not continued in the direction of 
closer relations with Russia. Early in 1920 the Soviet government 
had defeated Denikin, the Cossack leader who organized the anti- 
Bolshevist forces of southern Russia and the Kuban. Anticipating 



Success of 
Pilsudski 



334 



The New World 



Indefinite 
frontiers of 
eastern 
Poland 



Attack of 
Soviet 
armies on 
Poland 



a Soviet attack following Denikin's defeat, the Poles pressed forward 
for more than three hundred miles, took Kiev in May 1920, and held 
the northwestern part of the Ukredne. It now appeared as if Poland 
could realize her aspiration to settle her difficult eastern frontier 
question in her own way. Let us examine the background of the 
situation. 

The eastern frontiers of Poland are difficult to define because there 
are no sharp hues, whether of race, religion, or national conscious- 
ness. The historic boundary of 1772 is out of the question; it 
would include more non-Polish than Polish populations. The best 
defensible frontier is a line drawn through the Pripet marshes, in the 
headwater area of the Pripet River, but this also is far beyond (east 
of) the area of strictly Pohsh speech. And the world can never be 
at peace for long if every nation struggles for the best strategic fron- 
tier. No sooner is one strategic advantage gained than another farther 
on is desired to protect it. The process is endless. 

The eastern boundary of Poland as recommended by the Peace 
Conference at Paris is shown in Figure 169, and it was planned to 
leave to negotiation between the governments of Russia and of Poland 
the settlement of the precise boundary between these two countries. 
It was not thought wise to go further until the Russian people had 
a chance to reorganize their pohtical affairs and express their views 
as to the position of the Polish frontier. 

Poland could not forget those glorious pages of her history that 
recounted the heroic deeds of her leaders in eastern fields of war and 
commerce. Pohsh military power and intellectual force had made 
themselves felt from Vilna to Kiev. Polish colonies are scattered 
throughout this broad region. To be confined to ethnographic Poland 
was to accept the historic injustice from which she had so long suffered. 

The Russian Soviet government now took up the offensive with a 
concentration of forces along the Polish eastern frontier, and a vigorous 
attack swept the Polish army back to the gates of Warsaw (August 
1920). With its armies in a favorable position it was the turn of the 
Soviet government to make extreme demands upon the Poles. The 
acceptance of these demands would have made Poland a vassal of 
Russia and guaranteed the extension of Bolshevism into western 
Europe. Russia was to have a large army on Poland's frontier, and 
Poland was to have scarcely any army at all. Radical groups in 
Poland were to have government sanction, and there were to be no 
restrictions upon the spread of Soviet propaganda. Only in the 
matter of eastern territorial limits was there an apparent Uberahty ; 



Folarid and Its Disputed Borderlands 335 

but the other terms made this condition of no consequence. Faced 
by these conditions, Poland had no choice but to fight. 

With French leadership, munitions from the Allies, and fresh re- 
cruits from every rank of PoUsh society, the Polish army now took 
the offensive. In a few weeks it had reached a line corresponding 
roughly to the hue of German occupation in 1918 and the treaty of 
Brest-Litovsk. Here it remained while a treaty on new lines was 
framed by Russian and Pohsh representatives at Riga, the capital 
and chief seaport of Latvia (October 1920). The treaty was prelim- 
inary in nature, involving an armistice or truce of uncertain duration. 
Nor can it wear really serious aspects until a stable all-Russian govern- 
ment is formed in place of the present class government of the Soviets. 

The treaty of Riga fixed the eastern hmits of Poland beyond the 
line recommended by the Peace Conference of Paris (Figs. 169 and 
180). It required the payment of an indemnity to Poland. It was 
framed on the principle of no victory for either side and, most sig- 
nificant of all, it was signed by representatives of the Ukraine. Though 
the Ukrainian representatives were Bolshevist and not from Petlura's 
Repubhc of the Western Ukraine that had been fighting against the 
Poles during 1919 and with them in 1920, yet the fact that the rights 
of the Ukraine as a national or semi-national unit were recognized 
would make it appear easier, if the Alhes, including Poland, later 
desire it, to estabfish a line of cleavage between White Russia (Fig. 
191) and the Ukraine. It is often argued that Russia should be united 
because all the parts are needed to make a well-balanced state ; but 
this is hardly true of the Ukraine, the most nearly self-sufficing unit. 
In general it would be to the advantage of Poland, Rumania, and 
the western powers to divide Russia. Her reserves of man power 
are enormous, and if focused upon a weak border state hke Poland or 
Finland might prove to be overwhelming. 

The treaty between Poland and Soviet Russia has one feature that The viina 
wiU intensify the long-standing and bitter diff'erences between Poland ^*°™ 
and Lithuania. It provides for an eastern Pohsh frontier that em- 
braces the entire hinterland of Lithuania. It was precisely here that 
Lithuania herself expected to expand at Russia's expense. Moreover, 
the signing of the treaty was followed immediately by the Polish 
occupation of Vilna, in the heart of the country in dispute. The 
occupation was carried out by army leaders acting on their own 
initiative and under formal government censure, yet the sympathy of 
the Polish government for the acts of the irregular forces was unques- 
tioned. The matter was considered especiaUy unfortunate because 



336 



The New World 



Anti-Rus- 
sian feel- 
ing in 
Poland 



Basis for a 
pro-Rus- 
sian policy 



a truce had just been arranged between Lithuania and Poland, through 
the good offices of the League of Nations, that appeared to promise a 
settlement of their acute difficulties in the Suwalki region southwest 
of Yiina, where fighting had been going on for months. The action 
of the Poles at Vilna nuffifies this decision and makes the disputed 
zone a possible source of the gravest trouble. 

The hatred of the Pole for the Russian is based on differences of 
culture and mode of thought, on marked differences of religion, and 
on the terrible persecutions of the past hundred and fifty years. 
Poland is a nation of western ideas ; Russia is almost oriental by 
contrast. The strength of the hostility is suggested in the romantic 
poetry of Poland, which is full of anti-Russian allusions. 

Nevertheless, so fiercely concentrated is the feehng against Ger- 
many that there has grown up a very strong pro-Russian poUcy. 
It is not that this new party hates Russia less, but that it hates Ger- 
many more. It foresees failure and a new division of land and people 
if Poland does not become rather closely attached to one or the other 
of her two powerful neighbors. This was preeminently the theory of 
Pilsudski. Yet the settlement of almost every detail of the Polish 
frontiers has raised up an enemy. Russia will take nearly as lively 
an interest in the fate of Eastern Galicia as Germany takes in Upper 
Silesia or Czecho-Slovakia in Teschen. Another reason for a work- 
ing agreement between Poland and Russia lies in the fact that before 
the World War the PoHsh textile mills depended upon Russia for a 
market. Most of the manufactured products were sent east, not 
west. If this normal pre-war stream of trade is to be revived, per- 
manent peace with Russia is the first essential. 



The Polish 
Corridor 
west of 
the Vistula 



POLAND S OUTLET TO THE SEA : DANZIG AND THE POLISH CORRIDOR 

Poland is ill favored in the matter of its "corridor" to the sea, 
a narrow band of Polish population that extends along the western 
side of the Vistula to the Raltic (Fig. 167). It was the dream of all 
Poles that the peace settlement should give them a broader stretch 
than that occupied by "indisputably Pohsh population"; the more 
so since the Vistula has been regarded from the earliest periods of 
Polish nationality as a Polish river in its entirety. From the Car- 
pathians almost to the sea the banks of the Vistula have always been 
bordered by Polish populations. 

It was this ethnic corridor to the sea that the Germans for many 
years had been trying to Germanize. While the corridor was the 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



337 



scene of most intense penetration, the process was general throughout 
eastern Germany. German officials in great numbers were established 
everywhere. The Prussian government, working chiefly through the 
Imperial Colonization Commission, had sent more than 100,000 colo- 
nists into German Poland, giving them such substantial preference 
that the Polish farmer was gradually forced out. Large tracts were 
bought up by the government as forest reserves. Danzig, at the 
coastal end of the corridor, had its Polish population gradually reduced 
until Poles numbered but 10 per cent of the total of 170,000. Thus 
was fought out the last of the many struggles that were waged here 
between German and Slav for the possession of a strategic zone which 
each considered vital to its national security. 

The corridor upon which Poland depended for its "secure access 
to the sea," as promised by the Allied powers, had been so narrowed 
by artificial German settlement for many years before the World War 
that a strip but fifty miles across could be assigned to Poland on ethnic 
grounds. Danzig, the outlet port for the corridor and for Poland, was 
turned into a Free State, or 
Free City, though with Inter- 
allied guarantees to the Poles 
that will assure them full and 
regulated use of the port for 
goods and transport of Polish 
origin or destination (page 343). 

Danzig thus returns to some- 
what the same status that it 
enjoyed for more than three 
hundred years — 1454 to 1793. 
It was then practically a free 
republic, though joined volun- 
tarily to Poland and living 

under its sovereignty. During ^^^,^^ The Vistula in relation to Polish cities. 

this period there was attached 9^ ^ *°*^^ °^ '^^ "*^*^® °^ ™°^° ^^^^ 20,000 population 

■1 o •. 1, A ^"^ Poland, 23 are on the Vistula or its tributaries. 

to tne tree city an area about Theimprovementof the VistiUa and of the Free city 

half that of the present dis- of Danzig is an outstanding problem in the economic 

^ ^ geography of Poland. The railway freight traffic of 

trict. 

ternal government, yet .was 
Polish in sentiment and had 
common economic interests 
with the Polish state. The 
Polish government could pro- 



German 

coloniz- 
ing plans 




Poland's 
limited 
access to 
the sea 



Danzig, a 
free port in 
earlier 
times 



geography.. _, „ 

It managed its own in- Danzig before the World War was about five times 

as great as its river traffic on the Vistula. From 
Thorn (Th.) to Danzig the river is regulated by dikes. 
Farther upstream the regulating works are of small 
importance. The eastern boundary, of Poland is 
that of the preliminary treaty of Riga, 1920 ; it was 
slightly modified in the final treaty- Key to nu- 
merals; 1, Danzig; 2, Marienwerder ; 3, Orawa; 
4, Spits; 5, Teschen ; 6, Vilna disputed zone. 



338 



The New World 



Govern- 
ment of the 
new Free 
City of 
Danzig 



The future 
port of 
Danzig 




Fig. 170. The propor- 
tion of state officials in 
general becomes greater 
toward the east. They 
were almost all Germans 
and came from outside 
the region. Data from 
Staiistisches Jahrbuch fiir 
den Prcussischen Staat. 
Drawn from a manuscript 
map by Romer, with per- 
mission. 



tect itself from foreign 
attack at Danzig, close 
and reopen the port in 
case of danger, maintain 
a state official there to 
look out for national 
interests, and share to a 
moderate degree in the 
revenues, chiefly those 
derived from shipping. 
On the other hand, the 
free city could be rep- 
resented in the Pohsh 
Diet on great occa- 
sions ; and it enjoyed 
full rehgious freedom, 
coined money, and con- 
trolled the navigation 
of the natural water- 
ways of the city. 

The internationalized state, or Free City, of today has a High 
Commissioner appointed by the Council of the League of Nations. 
The boundaries of the Free City (which include both the city and the 
district about it) correspond roughly with the limits of German popu- 
lation, so that there will be the least possible cause for friction be- 
tween two antagonistic racial elements. This, of course, gives the 
Poles not quite the entire length of the river, but at the same time 
it does give them a chance to get it in the future ; for if Danzig is in 
truth to be the commercial focus of the new Poland, as it has become 
the only large seaport, its population will inevitably change from Ger- 
man to Polish, and new provisions will be made for giving Poland a still 
larger interest in its management. The population of the Danzig 
Free City zone is about 300,000, of which more than half resides in 
Danzig and Neufahrwasser. 

The port of Danzig without doubt will be rapidly improved by the 
nations responsible for its government. While Neufahrwasser is the 
port for Danzig (inset, Fig. 173), ocean-gotng steamers can also go to 
Danzig direct. Through Danzig will come cotton and wool for Polish 
mills, machine tools for the manufacture of machinery needed in Polish 
industries, agricultural implements, Swedish iron ore, Norwegian fish, 
and all the varied products, not made in Poland, of foreign mills and 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



339 




Fig. 171. Ethnography in the Polish Corridor, focus of conflict between Poland and Germany. 
The shaded areas represent German-speaking majorities ; the blank areas, Polish majorities- 
Solid heavy lines, present boundaries ; dotted line, plebiscite boundary ; dot-and-dash line, Russo- 
German boundary of 1914. The Marienwerder and AUenstein plebiscite areas have voted for 
union with Germany. 

factories. Down to the port will go, by way of the Vistula and the 
bordering railways, timber, salt, cement, hay, sugar from the beet 
sugar farms in which Poland has excelled, grain, and distinctive wares 
of Pohsh manufacture. It is noteworthy that though its rail connec- 
tions never have been particularly favorable, the city's rail traffic 
tonnage before the war was about five times its river traffic, if we 
exclude the lumber rafts and floats on the Vistula. The improvement 
of the Vistula and a reorganization of the facilities of transport are 
required to jnake Danzig a great Pohsh port. 




Fig. 172. Railways in the Polish Corridor, suggesting the difficulties of separating East Prussia 
from the rest of Germany and the equally great difficulties involved in depriving Poland of a 
maritime outlet by way of the Vistula. 

In the second half of 1919 a large number of new firms established 
themselves in Danzig in anticipation of the future importance of the 
free city as Poland's outlet to the sea. Most of the new firms were 
of German origin, many of them being branches of houses that had 
had no representatives at Danzig. Others came from Poland, from 
Scandinavia, and from the Netherlands. Only one American firm, 
one French, and two British shipping firms were reported, besides a 
branch of the British Trade Corporation with a general banking and 
insurance business. There are at least eight steamship lines estab- 
lished between Danzig and English ports, the trade with England 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



341 




Fig. 173. By the treaty of Versailles most of the country about Danzig that was inhabited by 
Germans was united to Danzig to form a Free City, named Free State in the map above. It is 
not a " city" in the ordinary sense of the word. The inset shows details of the port and suburbs 
of Danzig. 

consisting chiefly in the export of timber and sugar and the import of 
coal and herring. The imported coal is used mainly in Danzig itself, 
since it cannot compete farther inland with the coal of southern Poland. 

ON THE WESTERN BOUNDARY 

South of the Free City, or State, of Danzig under AUied control, Poles and 
Poles and Germans face each other on the Vistula, where the historic aga^fac- 
struggle between the two races is bound to continue. Their common i"g ^^"^^ 
boundary is twenty-five miles long, and some sort of international across the 
supervision seemed necessary if both were to use the river. While ^^^*"^* 
the Poles own both banks, German access is assured, for Article 18 of 
the minorities treaty between Poland and the AUied and Associated 
Powers provides for the application to the Vistula, including the Bug 
and the Narew (Fig. 168), a branch of the Bug entering it near War- 
saw, of the international waterways regime as established in the treaty 
of peace with Germany. 

Conomerce on the Vistula has not yet been developed on a large 
scale. For commercial, political, and sentimental reasons, however. 



342 



The New World 




t'lQ. 174. Turt ot ttic water trout ut JJanzig, 



IiucrHiUionai FUin iScrvice 



The Vis- 
tula in 
need of 
many im- 
provements 



Canals to 
connect 
with other 
hydro- 
graphic 
systems 



the Poles will quickly begin the improvement of the river, since it is 
their main stream. Poland embraces nearly the whole watershed 
of the Vistula (Fig. 109). 

Large sums of money will be needed for dredging and diking. The 
course of the stream is "braided" in places; that is, it is broken up 
into separate currents or channels by shifting sand bars, notably near 
Thorn. Ice rafts lodge upon the bars in winter and block the channel. 
From Thorn to the Baltic the river never has less than three feet of 
water ; but the difference in level between high and low water is here 
from twenty to twenty-five feet. Dredging and partial canalization 
are needed to deepen the main channel and thus permit the use of 
large river and canal boats, as on the Rhine, the Rhone, and the Seine. 
Improvements are now projected which would enable vessels of a 
thousand tons' capacity to reach Warsaw. 

The improvement of the Vistula would also permit the construc- 
tion of branch canals. The Mazurian lakes lie near some of the eastern 
tributaries of the Vistula, and have several hundred miles of navigable 
waterways that could be utilized. In a similar way the Jlussian rivers 
have been brought within reach of the Vistula system (Fig. 168). The 
Netze and the Vistula on the western Polish frontier are already 
connected by the Bromberg canal, as shown in the same figure. 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 343 

A preliminary economic agreement has been signed between Poland 
and the Free City of Danzig. Among its main provision^ are the 
following : 

(1) Danzig and Poland form a single customs territory so that 
customs are not levied on goods passing from one to the other. 

(2) Danzig will collect and pay over to Poland duties on goods for 
Poland originating outside of Danzig and passing through that 
port. 

(3) Cooperation is assured in the use of railways, since Danzig is 
in part dependent on Polish lines and, until a new line is built, 
Poland can reach parts of its Baltic territory northwest of 
Danzig only by crossing the Free City territory. 

(4) Danzig guarantees Poland all necessary shipping facilities and 
permits importation of war material destined for Poland. 

(5) There is ample provision for the free and early development of 
adequate postal, telegraphic, and telephonic service between 
Warsaw and other Polish towns and Danzig. 

POLISH AUTHORITY IN EASTERN GALICIA 

On Poland's southeastern frontier lies the former Austrian prov- poiish 
ince of Galicia, and there Poland faces one of her major problems. 
The western half is Polish, the eastern half Ruthenian. To differences GaUcia 
of race are added differences of religion : the Poles are Roman Catho- 
lic ; the Ruthenians are Greek Orthodox Uniate. The culture of 
Eastern Galicia is Polish, and Poles form the chief population of the 
towns ; no other section of the Polish people is more ardently Polish in 
nationality. It is the seat of a large university (Lcmberg). Hardly 
any other part of Polish territory has published so high a percentage 
of Polish books and newspapers. 

The Ruthenians, who form the majority (59 per cent) of the popu- contest be 
lation of Eastern Galicia, are closely allied to the Ukrainians or Rus- !7?^" ''^! 

T 11 Poles and 

sians rather than to the Poles. Lemberg and other similar districts Ukrainians 
are Polish islands set in a Ruthenian sea. The Ukrainians and oauda*™ 
Russians wish to unite with them all people classed as Ruthenian : 
the Poles ask to have recognized their predominant culture and former 
ownership, and especially to have their territory extended southward 
so as to join with Rumania (Fig. 2). The territorial junction with 
Rumania would give these two countries better defense against a 
Bolshevist penetration of central Europe ; it would provide what is 



traditions 
in Eastern 



344 



The New World 



Foreign 
invest- 
ments in 
the East 
GaJician 
oil ftelds 



Separate 
histories 
of East- 
em and 
Western 
Galicia 



Polish in- 
fluence 
dominant 
in Eastern 
Galicia 



called a military "barrage," or "sanitary cordon," all the way from 
the Baltic to the Black Sea, for a time one of the main objects in the 
PoUsh and even the Allied program. 

The Ruthenians of Eastern Galicia unquestionably desire union 
with a democratic Russia. On account of Polish persecutions, they 
do not wish to unite with Poland. But Eastern Galicia has been 
unable to keep order within its own house, and so far as an intelli- 
gent class exists, it is composed almost wholly of Poles, who form 
27 per cent of the population. 

Foreign capitalists are especially interested in the oil fields of East- 
ern Galicia (Fig. 175), and poHtical interest in this district is cor- 
respondingly keen. Of $65,000,000 invested in oil land and refineries 
there, $50,000,000 is British, $10,000,000 French, and $5,000,000 
Belgian. According as they are friends of Poland or of Russia will 
these nations be hkely to favor one or the other in deciding the ulti- 
mate fate of this valuable territory. 

The most important oil pools lie in the foothiUs of the Carpathians. 
The weUs are operated by trained Polish workmen. Now every 
new state is vitally interested in its future fuel supply, because with 
this goes the growth of manufacturing and commerce and, in general, 
better material existence for its industrial population. Junction 
with Rumania would give Poland control over the headwaters of the 
Dniester and permit the shipment of oil and other goods to ports 
on the Black Sea. 

The problem of Eastern Galicia is further complicated by the his- 
torical division that existed between Eastern and Western Gahcia 
as early as the 10th and 11th centuries. We shall not here trace 
this division in detail. The matter entered its modern phase in 1848, 
when a Ukrainian movement began in Austria that had for its object 
the creation of the eastern part of Gahcia as a separate province. 
For several years there was much controversy with the Poles over the 
question; but in 1867 Austria made the whole of Galicia a single 
province with a common assembly, or Diet. 

Since that time the Poles have become dominant in Galician affairs. 
They hve chiefly in the towns, while the Ruthenian population is for 
the most part agricultural. Of the Ruthenians more than 60 per cent 
are iUiterate, of the Poles 23 per cent only. The Poles naturally lead 
in the professions and in commerce. They have controlled adminis- 
tration, courts, and education, and have obtained much of the land. 
Their methods have not always been above reproach. The struggle 
was one of those minor contests of nationaUty that were overshadowed 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



345 




Fig. 175. Distribution of known oil deposits in Galicia, with railroad lines related thereto. 
The recommended eastern boundary of Poland was designed to be temporary. For further 
details respecting the boundaries of Poland and its neighbors, see Figure 169. Oil deposits after 
Redwood, A Treatise on Petroleum, 3d ed., 1913, Vol. I. 

in the past by the common antagonism of all subject races to the 
central government of Austria-Hungary. 

According to the terms of a proposed treaty between Poland and Treaty 
the Allied and Associated Powers, Eastern Galicia was to have an land con- 
autonomous government within the Polish state, freedom of speech, ceming 
press, and assembly, and a single-chamber Diet, elected every five GaUcia 
years by universal suffrage. The final status of the district has yet 
to be determined. In view of Poland's recent treaty with Russia 
(Riga, 1920) there seems Httle doubt that Eastern Galicia will be in- 
corporated eventually as an integral part of the Polish state. 



THE PLEBISCITE AREAS 

The ownership of a large part of the Polish borderland was Plebiscites 
determined by plebiscite in three districts : (1) Mazuria, which part orSe^ 
comprises the whole of the District of Aliens tein, and which voted ^"""J^'^ 
overwhelmingly to remain German; (2) the part of West Prussia 
that lies east of the Vistula, which also voted to remain German; 
and (3) a part of Silesia, which* except in a few districts, voted to 
remain German. The case of Silesia is pecuHarly important, for the 



346 



The New World 



Contest for 
the coking 
coal of 
Teschen 




Prussian state-owned 
coal mines might be- 
come the center of 
important Pohsh in- 
dustries. More than 
45,000,000 tons of coal 
were produced in Silesia 
in 1913, or a sixth of 
Germany's total pre- 
war production. The 
vote of 20 March 1920 
showed that a majority 
of the inhabitants of 
Silesia preferred Ger- 
man ownership, but the 
final line of division will 
depend upon geo- 
graphical and economic 
conditions as well as the 
plebiscite. In Mazuria, 
Poland lost a large ele- 
ment which is Polish in 
speech and race, but 
Protestant-Lutheran 
rather than Catholic hke 
the majority of Poles. 



Teschen 

The former Duchy of 
Teschen (Fig. 178) has 



Fig 176 Coal and iron deposits and railways of the disputed 

areas of Teschen and Silesia. In the mineral districts both 

main and secondary railways are shown, elsewhere only mam 

railways. The Silesian plebiscite was held on 20 March 1921. ^ i i • 

The Teschen dispute was transferred from the plebiscite com- Jjg^(J g^ smgularly impor- 

mission to the Council of Ambassadors (footnote page 347). , . 

If their recommendations are confirmed, Poland will retam the tant pari LU pict;y iii 

town of Teschen and all territory east of the principal north- p^ljgjj affairs. HcrC is 

south railway; Czecho-Slovakia will obtain the railway and o ^ f 

all territory west of it (Fig. 179). Coal from various maps t^e SOUrCC Ot SUpply Ol 

accompanying Handbuch des oberschlesischen Industriebezirks . . i £ y^^Jj 

XII Allgemeiner deutschen Bergmannstag, Festschrift, Band U. COKUlg COai lOI UUUi 

Iron from F. Hamburg, Schulkarte zur Kidtvr-WirlscJiafis und pQ^^ud and Czccho- 

Handcls-GeograpHe von Deutschland, 1 : 750,000. 1913. gj^^^i^j^^ g^^ Poland 

has large deposits of higher-grade bituminous coal, while Czecho- 
slovakia has lower-grade bituminous coal and deposits of inferior 
brown hgnite. In addition, the coal mines of Teschen lie in the 
western third of that district, just where the Czech population fives. 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



347 



DNan/oo! 



Cs' i-'JNanr.o o« o *,••• -„ ••? 

IU_a_» • *^ • «^— ^^« •_• >3 




/ 



SILESIA 

NATIONALITIES 






■^fc?°° 



'°°° °o8, 







It was decided to attempt 
agreement between Po- 
land and Czecho-Slova- 
kia, through the Council 
of Ambassadors, estab- 
lished by the AlHes. By 
the terms of the pre- 
liminary agreement the 
larger western part of 
Teschen would go to 
Czecho-Slovakia and the 
rest to Poland ; the Pohsh 
part includes the head- 
waters of the Vistula, 
where these take their 
rise in the Tatra, the 
lofty northern summits of 
the Carpathians. If the 
agreement is confirmed, 
Czecho-Slovakia will own 
the coal mines but will 
deliver a part of the out- 
put to Poland. The cen- 
tral railway would go to 
Czecho-Slovakia, while 
Poland would secure the 
town of Teschen. 

4 • . J '.K .1 Fig. 177. Ethnic distributions in Silesia and Teschen. The 

iA-SSOCiaieQ Wlin tne boundary of the Silesian plebiscite area (heavy broken line) 

Teschen settlement were ^^^^^ ^^ only a part of German Silesia. For general compari- 

. son and key to names see Figure 176. After Homer, Travaux 

the two districts of Orawa geograpUques, Vol. IV, 1919. 

and Spits, which have 

small groups of Polish people that Poland wished to include. By a 
decision of the Council of Ambassadors ^ the territorial limits were 
recommended as shown in Figure 179. In Orawa the new boundary 
is located southward of the main Carpathian divide; in Spits it is 
located north of the divide. As in the Teschen dispute, the matter 
awaits final decision, the Polish Diet, or Parliament, having so far 
(April 1921) withheld its approval in the hope of securing a larger 
share of the Teschen coal. 

1 The Council of Amba sa^^lcs, composed of Allied amba^^sadors, was organized after the 
Peace Conference of Paris early in 1920. Its chief function is to execute the treaties of 
peace. In addition there have been various conferences of Allied premiers at Sein Remo, 
Hythe, Boulogne, etc. 



COMMUNES 



of 200-1 000 of 1000-5000 ofover500(J 
inhaDitants inhabitants infiabifant: 



*<v 



'••:V 



Polish 
Germa 
Czech 



J lis Ml 1! 



348 



The New World 



Dangers of 
militarism 



Fear as a 
basic cause 
of war 



Poland 
potentially 
a wealthy 
nation 



. ^ 


NV,,-— ^ — ■% ufJf 




^^-^ 




\ J?>^ 


^ 


s 


K^ 


' 


-1 


r^ 


n 




r ' 


^^SoFnPdek ^Ko 


) 


SESCHE 
\ 


\ 


BieliU^Bia 


la 


N / ) 


/ 




WFriedland 


<*> 


\ 


/"^Tablunkan 


\ 
\ Bar^nia 

) 




43» 
30' 


, ~ isW' 


■^"i V 


!*">»- 


^^^(abfunka'^^Pass^ l|g» 


4838 


R?^Coal- 


producing rep 


on 


\ ' ' 





Fig. 178. The Teschen region, ownership of which is in dis- 
pute between Poland and Czecho-Slovakia. For preliminary 
boundary see Figure 179; for general relations see Figure 167. 



MILITARISM AND THE 
FRONTIER PROBLEMS 

Everywhere the fron- 
tiers of Poland are on 
the open plain except 
in the south, where the 
high Carpathians form 
a natural common fron- 
tier between Poland 
and Czecho-Slovakia. 
Nothing therefore could 
be clearer than that 
Poland should strive to 
win the friendship of 
her neighbors. She has 
to choose between two 
courses of action. If 
she becomes militaris- 
tic, hke the Prussians, 
she, hke them, may be strong for a time, only to fall a victim to 
her own strength. To be sure, a limited army is necessary to prevent 
her from being helpless in case of wanton attack. 

The old argument that "we are hemmed about by enemies" and 
that open plains everywhere invite attack was the stock in trade of 
the war party of Berlin. If leaders can get their people to believe 
it and to become sufficiently "jumpy" about it, they can impose heavy 
taxes for large armies that are meant, not for the defense of the coun- 
try, but for aggrandizement and the satisfaction of greed, until at last, 
having dug a pit for others, they fall into it themselves. The Polish 
army now numbers nearly 800,000, which, in the ratio of the two popu- 
lation totals, would correspond to an army of 3,500,000 or 4,000,000 
for the United States. Beginning her new national life without a 
debt of great consequence, Poland has a chance to be free. If her 
army continues big, her debt will rise ; her neck wiU be placed in a yoke 
from which centuries of effort may not free her. 

If she chooses the road of reason, Poland may become a great state. 
She starts with a population of 25,000,000, or more than that of Spain 
and about as large as that of Brazil. Her territory is drained chiefly 
by a single large stream capable of improvement from the Baltic to 
Warsaw and far beyond. Her forests have an extent of about 300,000 
square miles. Her soil has long been famous for its fertihty. There 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



349 




Fig. 179. Division of disputed territory in the three districts of Teschen, Orawa, and Spits. 
The Teschen settlement is now awaiting the approval of the Polish Diet (page 347). For details 
of the Teschen area, see Figures 176 and 178. 

is abundant water power in the glaciated northern regions and in the 
Carpathians on the south, where large, swift streams flow through 
dense forests before reaching the agricultural plain. 



credit to 
start in- 
dustries 



INTERNAL PROBLEMS 

Industrial Recovery 

Poland's immediate problem is to secure sufficient credit to start Need for 
her mills, factories, and mines. Warsaw, a city of 900,000 people, had 
its machinery largely destroyed or stolen by the Germans. The same 
fate was suffered by Lodz, one of the great textile cities of the world 
and often called the "Manchester" of Poland. Germany set out to 
cripple Polish industry. It will take money and credit to revive it. 
Lodz alone requires $10,000,000 merely to purchase the necessary 
machinery. 

The Lodz factories have a higher production than any others. A 
quarter of the Polish cotton and woolen mills had resumed operation 
by the summer of 1920. Every month Poland must import 4000 tons 
of cotton, 2000 tons of wool, and 13,000 tons of jute, to supply her 
textile factories. Credit for raw materials is the largest present need 
of Poland. 

There are rich deposits of salt, potash, zinc, lead, and oil, all 
likewise dependent for their development upon credits and railways. 



350 



The New World 



Devastated 
region of 
Eastern 
Poland 







Brest-Litovsk Line 

:•.•.•:•.• Polish-Russ.Agreement 

, Polish-Ukrain. „ 

=.Polish-Ljthiianian Demarcation Line 'V 

(I 100 2(111 o(jo«- I |25 



Fig. 180. Boundary complications of Poland's borderlands. The approximate limits of the 
Ukraine are shown by a heavy broken line. Note that Poland's eastern frontier as established 
at the Riga peace conference with Soviet Russia extends northward to the Dvina and cuts off 
Lithuania from contact with Russia. For the settlement of the three small areas of Teschen, 
Orawa, and Spits in southwestern Poland (numbered 2, 3, and 4) see Figure 179. The area 
numbered 1 is the Silesian plebiscite area. The Polish-Ukrainian agreement referred to in the 
legend is that of April 1920- 

security of life and property, and stability of government. Po- 
land's natural resources can be developed only when the agencies of 
commerce are organized, and especially when the railroads are put 
into sound condition and coal production has risen to correspond with 
the manufacturing needs of the country. 

Displacement of Population 

During the World War the territory of Poland was overrun first 
by the Russians and then by the Germans and Austrians. The 
effect was wholly to depopulate large tracts. Still farther east the 
country was in part denuded by the Bolshevists of everything neces- 
sary for living. What was once the seat of a dense farming popu- 
lation became a desert. People flocked to the cities and there in- 
creased the number of idle, restless, and desperate elements, already 
large because of unemployment, for the Germans had taken away 
all the spindles and gear from the mills and in many cases burned or 
blown up the factory buildings. 

If we use the ordinary terms for Polish suffering, it is difficult to 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 351 

describe the broad zone at and beyond the eastern borders of the Famine zone 
country, inhabited by Lithuanians, White Russians, Ukrainians, gthL? 
and Jews, which ahnost down to the present has remained a sparsely Poland 
populated desert, following its devastation by Grand Duke Nicholas 
during the Russian retreat, in the autumn of 1915. The famine 
zone begins at Brest-Li to vsk. Factories are idle, streets deserted, 
shops closed, because there is notliing to sell. People live principally 
on the cheapest vegetables. Fuel is hardly to be had at all. The 
death rate rose from 15 per 1000 in 1914 to 29 per 1000 in 1919 in 
the town of Pinsk. 

The wave of agricultural population now spreading eastward from changing 
the cities to occupy the land is of different ethnic character from the of^eaSem^^ 
old population. Although many of the former residents are returning Poland 
to their old firesides, many others have been killed, and some have 
emigrated, with the result that for many years, or until a new census 
is taken, all maps of eastern Poland showing density of population 
and ethnic distributions will be mere guesses based on local statistics 
and the reports of travelers. 

Three Unlike Sections 

One of the difficulties of the new government of Poland is to weld Problem 
together three unlike sections. There were really three Polands — three u 
German Poland centering at Posen, Russian Poland centering at War- 
saw, and Austrian, or Galician, Poland centering at Cracow and 
Przemysl.^ Under normal conditions these three could supplement 
each other; but at the end of the war they were administratively 
and commercially unorganized, and the railroads and rolhng stock 
were in bad condition, so that one part was enduring famine whilst 
another had an abundance of foodstuffs. Industrial disorganiza- 
tion and unemployment were the two chief troubles. The three sec- 
tions are also unlike socially and politically. German Poland is the 
most progressive and prosperous section. Congress (Russian) Poland 
has a population less alert, and Austrian Poland has, in part, a large 
low-grade population of Ruthenians. 

Proportional to its industries and the density of its population, 
that part of Poland that was included in Russia had few railroads, 

^ At the time of the outbreak of the World War in 1914, the territory and population of 
ethnographic Poland were divided about as follows: Russia, 15,000 square miles, 12,000,000 
inhabitants; Germany, 22,500 square miles, 4,000,000 inhabitants; Austria, 11,000 square 
miles, 5,000,000 inhabitants. 



like sec- 
tions 



352 



The New World 




Fig. 181. There is a close correspondence between the seats of industry and the foci of popula- 
tion as shown in Figure 168. Based on Romer, Atlas geographique et statistique de la Pologne, 
1916, PI. 30, supplemented by Andree, Handatlas, PI. 40. 



Produc- 
tion and 
emigration 
in former 
Russian 
Poland 



and the cart roads were little better than tracks. Agriculture was 
backward and crop production low. The Polish peasant in many 
districts lived more primitively than any other class of people in 
central Europe. In some regions where production was highest there 
were no foodstuffs for export, farms being small and families large. 
From the standpoint of its actual industrial development, Russian 
Poland was overpopulated, and the mass of the population survived 
only because of the rehef afforded by a continuous stream of emigra- 
tion. In 1913 there came to the United States 174,000 Russian Poles 
(excluding Jews), and there was heavy seasonal migration, more than 
350,000 Poles going to Germany to work on German farms in the 
summer months during the year just before the World War, and about 
50,000 to other countries. A similar migration of Poles took place to 
and from the Westphahan coal fields of Germany. 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



353 



B A L TIC 




Fig. 182. Note that Russian Poland had the greatest increase of population. It is significant 
in relation to Polish claims and ambitions on the east that Poles have increased in Eastern Galicia 
and in general in the belt of country just east of the line recommended by the Peace Conference 
at Paris (heavy broken line). Such a tendency might ultimately change the ethnic situation. 
Based on Romer, Atlas geographique et statistique de la Pologne, 1916, Pis. 7 and 11. 

Having rich mineral resources, Galicia, or Austrian Poland, is 
well supplied with railways. The same is true of German Poland, 
where industrial development had been carried far, especially in the 
Posen district. In the latter the number of textile factories had in- 
creased between 1901 and 1910 by 87 per cent and the output by 65 
per cent. 

The Land Situation 

Most of Poland is a land of farms. The agricultural population is Poland a 
greater in numbers to the square mile (190 for Congress Poland) ^^Jq*^* 
than in any of the other countries of Europe save Italy, Belgium, 
and Holland (Fig. 168). It is a compact and, to this extent, a pow- 
erful nation. The area of ethnographic Poland is about 80,000 square 
miles, or 40 per cent as great as Spain, or twice the state of Ohio. 



354 



The New World 



How Po- 
land be- 
came a 
refuge 
for the 
Jews 



Jewish 
rights and 
restric- 
tions 



Jewish de- 
sire for a 
state 
within a 
state 



Like their neighbors, the Poles have a land question of serious 
aspect. Among large landholders, 18,000 own 40 per cent of the 
total area of Poland and leave much of their holdings uncultivated, 
with resultant overcrowding of adjacent agricultural communities. 
To better the conditions of life, the Polish Diet in July 1920 voted 
drastic land partition laws. But even this action will not give every- 
body a piece of land, nor will it necessarily increase production. The 
new law permits the Polish General Land Office to take the lands of 
the former Prussian Colonization Commission and other government 
owned land, as well as large privately held estates, and sell them to 
actual farmers, with preference to soldiers wounded in the war. 
Depending upon location, the maximum size of farms may not 
exceed 150, 450, and 600 acres. 

The Jewish Population 

The most serious racial problem in Poland concerns the Jew. He 
is more numerous there than in any other country in the world ex- 
cept Russia. During the 14th and 15th centuries the Jews came 
to Poland in great numbers, partly because of expulsion from many 
other European countries, partly to escape almost universal perse- 
cution elsewhere. In the 18th century many came from Austria and 
West Prussia. Poland was one of the few countries that never ex- 
pelled the Jew. 

Then the Jews became so numerous and powerful that they 
secured a general assembly in 1600 to apportion taxes among Jewish 
citizens and protect the rights of the race, and this continued until 
1764. Jews competed with Christians in commerce and in the crafts 
with such success that eventually they were restricted by law. For 
example : in Galicia they were forbidden to be grain dealers ; they 
could not export salt or deal in alcohol ; their artisans could not be 
employed by Christians. By 1895, while only 14 per cent of the 
total population of Russian Poland were Jewish, 84 per cent of the 
merchants were Jews, 20 per cent of the literary men, 51 per cent of 
the educators, and 24 per cent of the physicians. Only 2 per cent of 
the farmers, factory workers, and miners were Jews. (From Russian 
census reports of 1897.) 

The main difficulty of the problem springs from the lack of na- 
tional feeling among Jews. Throughout Poland's history they have 
worked rather for racial rights than for national revolutionary aims. 
In 1907 they opposed the Polish national parties and contributed to a 
SociaUst victory. 



Poland and Its Disputed Borderlands 



355 



In 1919 the problem entered a new phase with the disorders at 
Vilna and elsewhere. The PoUsh Jew had not thrown himself whole- 
heartedly into the development of the new state. It was natural 
that the patriotic Pole should view his new-found freedom with ardent 
feeUng and should have little toleration for any race that resisted the 
strong tides of nationalism. Better relations have now been estab- 
lished, and there need be no further political importance in the Jew- 
ish problem if religious liberty is guaranteed and the Jew attempts to 
seek no special political rights. 

In common with the states of Rumania, Greece, Jugo-Slavia, 
Czecho-Slovakia, Austria, and Hungary, Poland signed a minorities 
treaty with the AlUed and Associated Powers.^ The matter is es- 
pecially important for Poland in relation to -the Jews. Article 10 
pipvides that educational committees shall be appointed locally by 
the Jewish communities of Poland and shall be subject to the general 
control of the state ; it provides for the distribution of the propor- 
tional share of the public funds allotted to Jewish schools, and for the 
organization and management of these schools. Article 11 requires 
that Jews shall not be compelled to perform any act which consti- 
tutes a violation of their Sabbath, the only exceptions being in case 
of military service or the preservation of public order. Poland will 
refrain from holding elections, either general or local, on Saturday. 



Recent dis- 
orders in- 
volving the 
Jew 



The 

minorities 

treaties 



Special 
provisions 
in the Po- 
lish treaty 



POLAND S RELATIONS WITH FRANC E AND GREAT BRITAIN 

France has taken a keener interest in the new Poland than has 
any other nation. The French wish Poland to be both free and strong, 
and thus provide a powerful ally in case of future trouble with Ger- 
many, one favorably placed to strike with France on either side. 
This explains the encouragement given in France (1916-1919) to the 
organization and equipment of the Polish Legion, the use of French 
instructors in Haller's army, which was trained in France and entered 
Poland in 1919, and French diplomatic aid to Poland. It will explain 
much in the international arrangements of Europe in the future. 
Trade agreements with Poland wiU reflect French interest, for French 
goods have not been sold widely in the former Russian Empire- 
Moreover, there is a historic cultural basis for the friendship' of the 
two peoples. French and Polish artists and men of letters have long 

^ In common with the other states that signed the minorities treaties, Poland must give 
equality of trade conditions to the Allied and Associated Powers, and, in addition, she agrees 
to the appUcation to the Vistula, the Bug, and the Narew rivers of the international water- 
ways regime as set forth in the treaty of Versailles. 



France 
deeply in- 
terested in 
Poland's 
welfare 



356 



The New World 



British 
naval and 
com- 
mercial 
interests 
in Danzig 
and Poland 



had a marked community of sentiment and interest. Henry of 
Valois, Duke of Anjou, was invited to become King of Poland, and 
reigned at Warsaw for a few years before he became Henry III, 
King of France. Napoleon revived Polish nationality for a brief 
period (Duchy of Warsaw, 1807-1815). One of the four best collec- 
tions of Polish books outside Poland was established in Paris by the 
poet Mickiewicz and is still directed by his son. (The three others 
are at Petrograd in Russia, at Rapperswil in Switzerland, and in the 
British Museum at London.) 

British economic interest in Poland is expressed in three ways: 

(1) Desire to have a British HigL Commissioner at Danzig. 

(2) Heavy British investments at Danzig and in the Gahcian oil 
fields. 

(3) British-held stock in the factories and mills of Lodz and in the 
coal companies of the south and southwest. 

With Danzig an active commercial center and eventually a large 
city, and with British naval strength capable of controlling the city's 
government in time of war, Great Britain may be said to have won 
a commercial victory by securing a free-city regime for Danzig. She 
followed steadfastly the pohcy of not allowing it to return to Germany, 
nor would she consent to Polish sovereignty. 

The French and British policies, opposed as they are with reference 
to all things PoUsh, were thrown into sharper contrast when, begin- 
ning in March 1921, the Silesian disorders became a matter of inter- 
national concern because of their relation to the reparation payments. 
The German government sought to delay beyond May 1921 an agree- 
ment on reparations required by the treaty of Versailles, saying that 
the fate of the mineral wealth of Silesia was related to the amount of 
the payments Germany could make. An ultimatum from the Allies 
brought Germany to terms and the Silesian problem will have an 
independent settlement. But the problems of both Silesia and Dan- 
zig cannot be settled by fiat. In the years ahead French and British 
policies may be expected to clash again and again in these key situa- 
tions, and full advantage will doubtless be taken by Germany of the 
political possibilities of impending disagreements. 



weakness 
of Lithuania 



CHAPTER TWENTY 

LITHUANIAN DEVELOPMENT AND RELATIONS 

The Lithuanians are a weak people politically, though numbering Present 
more than 2,000,000, and including up to 4,000,000 of population in 
their territorial claims. Historically they have had close relations 
with Poland ; yet they now fiercely hate the Poles. Ethnically they 
grade into Russians on the east ; yet they desire nothing else so little 
as a return to Russian domination. Commercially they are disor- 
ganized, undeveloped, dependent ; yet they wish independence and a 
hold upon the trade of Russia that normally flows in large volume 
through the Lithuanian port of Memel. A brief review of their 
historical struggle and their geographical environment is needed to 
understand their present anomalous political situation. 

EXPANSION OF LITHUANIA 

For centuries the Lithuanian pagan tribes occupied a part of the Coming of 
Baltic fringe of eastern Europe, and their settlements extended inland Jo^^^"" 
only to Kovno on the Niemen (Fig. 183). They were shut off from Knights 
the people about them by the heavy forests of the region and by the 
innumerable lakes and marshes. When the forests were partly cleared 
away and a commerce had developed, strong covetous neighbors in- 
vaded the land, for there are no mountain barriers — it is a plains 
country throughout — and the coast is easily accessible to other Bal- 
tic states. In the 13th century came the first invaders, the Teutonic 
Knights (page 362). Hard pressed by the newcomers, the Lithuanians 
withdrew from the coast and rapidly extended their eastern limits. 

The power of the nation seemed to grow in proportion to its diffi- Former 
culties. From a small state of 30,000 square miles in 1263, it be- greatness 
came a large nation of 250,000 square miles in 1385 (Fig. 183). In extent 
little more than a hundred years, Lithuania pushed its southern fron- 
tier to the Black Sea. It controlled the entire Dnieper and the Nie- 
men, one of the great historical highways across Europe during the 
centuries before. This brought it to the Polish frontiers, and even- 
tually it joined the Polish state. 

THE UNION WITH POLAND 

The union of Lithuania and Poland in 1386 was a personal union 
through the king, who was as much the king of Lithuania as of Po- 
land. Tkis lasted until 1569, when there was effected a closer union 

357 



358 



The New World 




Fig. 183. Bused on Droyisen, Allgcmctncr Historischc Handa'las, PI. 37. From the G^o- 

{jraphical Review, Vol. 4, 1917. 



Revival of 
national 
sentiment 
in the i8th 
and igth 
centuries 



llu()iifi;h a coimnon Diet, with Lilluiania slill keeping a separate army 
and treasury and having its own adniinislration. In 1691 the former 
distinction between the Grand Ducliy of Lithuania and the Pohsh 
state was abolished. Tliereafter there was to be a common admin- 
istration, one army, and one treasury. 

Thus Lithuania was assured the support of Poland, at first against 
the Teutonic Knights and later against the growing Muscovite power, 
and was able to preserve its western civilization against the rising 
tide of oriental influence. Had Poland remained independent, the 
fusion of Polish and Lithuanian peoples would probably have been 
uninterrupted and the present antagonism between them would not 
exist. Nationalism has been carried so far that most groups, how- 
ever small, seek separate existence. 

In the 18th century a great educational movement began, which re- 
sulted in the printing of grammars, dictionaries, poems, stories, etc. In 
the 19lh century came a further revival of national sentiment, and the 
publication of newspapers, folklore, ballads, and fables. All these pub- 
lications were greatly stimulated by the rehgious spirit of the times. 



Lithuanian Development and Relations 859 

TATE OF LITHUANIA IN THE PARTITIONS OF POLAND 

At the Lime of the partitions of Poland (1772-1795), the greater Russian 
part of Lithuania came into the hands of Russia, which organized it Lithuania 
as a province and put a governor in charge. The land-owning nohles 
were left in local control. In 1831 and 18G3 the Lithuanian and Polish 
higher classes revolted against Russia, whereupon the Russian gov- 
ernment confiscated many of the large estates of the nobles and di- 
vided the land among the peasants, exiling the revolutionists. After 
1864 the printing of Lithuanian books in Latin script was prohibited. 
The Russian language was made obligatory in the schools and in 
official reports and documents. The government seized Lithuanian 
books printed in Germany or Austria and imported into Lithuania. 
In 1905 a Lithuanian congress met at Vilna and protested against the 
acts of the Russian government, demanding Lithuanian autonomy 
and the use of the Lithuanian language. 

In that portion of Lithuanian territory which lay north of the TheLithu- 
Niemen and which was included in East Prussia, the Germans have Ea'^t"^ ° 
carried on the usual Germanizing process (Frederic William I, in the Prussia 
18th century, sent several thousand colonists into the country), but 
the region has remained strongly Lithuanian despite their efforts. 
In 1844 the Lithuanian language was forbidden, but later it was per- 
mitted in the schools for instruction. In 1896 it was decreed that 
German was the official language. 

THE ECONOMIC BASIS 

Lithuania is without mineral deposits of commercial importance 
and nmst depend primarily upon its forests and crops for means of 
livelihood and commerce. The chief occupation is a primitive type 
of agriculture, with cereals, flax, and potatoes as the principal products. 
Not more than half the tillable land was formerly owned by the 
peasants. The population consists mostly of small farmers. Since 
the organization of the provisional government of Lithuania, most of 
the landed estates have been seized and divided among the peasants. 

One of the great difficulties of a state of this character is to develop Need of a 
products which industrial nations want and which create a trade Srlde^bii- 
balance, for this makes possible the purchase of foreign wares like a°ce 
machinery, shoes, cloth, and special articles of food. The only way 
in which Lithuania can obtain such a trade balance is to sell its raw 
products, of which the most important in value are flax, rye, and flax- 
seed, in the order named. Its transportation conditions are still poor. 



360 



Tlie New World 



The Niemen, 
an old 
Lithuanian 
frontier 



The part nearest East Prussia lias almost no good roads, though its 
soil is more fertile than that of any other part of the country. 

The conmiercial organizations are almost whoUy in the hands of 
foreigners — Jews especially, and Germans. Lithuania was a part of 
the Jewish Pale (Fig. 192), and the towns are more Jewish than 
those of Poland. Vilna is often called the Jerusalem of Lithuania. 

PRESENT TERRITORIAL AND POLITICAL PROBLEMS 

While a good many Lithuanians live south of the Niemen (or 
Memel), they form a large majority north of that river at the tip of 
East Prussia, and it was this section, including the port of Memel, 
that, by the treaty of Versailles, Germany ceded to the Allied and As- 
sociated Powers, by them presumably to be turned over to Lithuania. 
The Niemen is to the Lithuanians what the Danube is to the Rmna- 
nians and the Rhine to the French. 

The Niemen separates the Lithuanians from their foes : 



Disputed 
boundaries 
of Lithu- 
ania 



On this side thi'ohgs of Lithuanian youths, 

On the other, in helmet and armor. 

The Germans on horseback stand immovable. 

Each party watches the crossing. 

So the Niemen, once famed for hospitality, 

That linked the realms of fraternal nations, 

Now for them has become the threshold of eternity 

For none without loss of life or liberty 

Could cross the forbidden waters. 

Adam Mickiewicz, Konrad Wallenrod 

The territorial and political problems include the settlement of the 
disputed boundary between Poland and Lithuania in the Suwalki 
region and in the provinces of Vilna and Kovno. A disputed boundary 
also exists on the east, where Lithuanians and Wliite Russians merge 
into each other without strong ethnic distinctions. Here is a region 
fertile in political disputes. No one can say with certainty what are 
the distinctions between Lithuanians, Poles, and Russians. A de- 
marcation line had to be established in 1919, as shown on Figure 180, 
to prevent fighting between Poles and Lithuanians, and no arrange- 
ment has yet been made between Lithuania and Russia. It is just 
here that the Poles wish to extend their territory according to their 
eastern program and the preliminary treaty M'ith Soviet Russia, 
signed at Riga in October 1920. If confirmed by a later treaty with 



Lithuanian Development and Relations 361 

a permanent or an All-Russian government, the present treaty 
will interpose a belt of Polish territory along Lithuania's hinterland 
and put Poland in a favorable stralegic position with respect to 
Russia's Baltic trade. Territorial and commercial restriction of this 
sort has been Lithuania's apprehension, and she may be expected to 
oppose it with all her strength. 

The population of the disputed zone has little poUtical self-con- Hopes of 
sciousness. Its outlook has been admirably summarized by Colder : *^ ^^°^^^ 

This, brings us to the question of the common people. How 
about them? What do they think and how do they feel on these 
matters? On the border districts many of the inhabitants do not 
know and do not care to what nationality they belong. For genera- 
tions Polish, Lithuanian, and Russian peasants have lived side by 
side, have intermarried, have laughed over the same joys, and have 
wept over the same sorrows. They have even a 'common speech' 
which is different from any one of the three national languages. For 
generations they have been exploited by Lithuanian, Polish, and 
Russian landlords, and they have not much love for any of them. 
The poor peasants are not interested either in cultural development 
or in national independence ; many of them do not even understand 
the meaning of these words. What they want is steady work, good 
wages, and plenty to eat. They hate landlords of all nationalities, 
and they have no reason to think that a b'ishop of their own people 
would treat them with more consideration than one of another people. 
Ninety per cent of every nationality in Europe is more interested in 
social than national problems, in the question of food and wages 
than in culture and independence. 

It might be to the interest of Lithuania to combine with either a possible 
Esthonia or Latvia, or both, and form a confederation (page 368) ; for 
the Letts are closely related to the Lithuanians in language, race, and tion 
customs, and their economic and political problems are about the 
same. The danger of political exploitation by the German barons 
is always real. But it would probably be lessened by a confedera- 
tion which would permit the ready flow of information and would 
probably increase the number and effectiveness of joint proposals to 
end foreign domination. 

The status of Lithuania itself has not yet been settled. While Fate of 
it leeks independence, no final recognition can be made until Russia, siu un""^ 
of which it once formed a part, is orderly again. The present pro- detennined 
visional government is strongly anti-Polish, but there is no doubt that 
if Lithuania voluntarily joins Russia, it will be only on the basis of 
a large local autonomy. 



Baltic 
Confedera- 



CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE 



Exploita- 
tion of 
peasants by 
German 
and Rus- 
sian over- 
lords 



Brothers 
of the 
Sword and 
Teutonic 
Knights 



LAND TENURE AND TRADE OUTLETS IN ESTHONIA AND LATVIA — 
THE FORMER BALTIC PROVINCES 

At the beginning of the World War, Esthonia, Livonia, and Cour- 
land, known as the Baltic Provinces, were parts of the Russian Em- 
pire. The people of the region have now formed two states : 
(1) Esthonia, which is composed of the old province of Esthonia and 
more than half of Livonia ; and (2) Latvia, formed out of the rest 
of Livonia and the whole of Courland. The Esthonian National 
Council was provisionally recognized by Great Britain on 3 May 
1918, and similar recognition of the Letts was made on 18 November 
1918, after the formation of the Lettish National Council at Riga 
(late in 1917) and the organization of a provisional government. 
Final recognition of both states was effected January 1921. 

DOMINATION BY OTHER PEOPLES 

These two new states do not base their claim to independence upon 
historical precedents, for they were always under the control of others 
— Germans, Swedes, or Russians. Their claim springs from the desire 
of the mass of the people to avoid that exploitation which has been 
their lot for centuries. No one can understand their present desire 
for self-government without examining the historic causes that have 
sharpened their opposition to the overlordship of Russians and Ger- 
mans ahke. The exploitation of the peasants, who form the bulk 
of the population, has been carried on through a system of land tenure 
that has its roots in the events of the 12th century, when German 
traders first visited the region to exchange wares with the natives. 

With the traders came missionaries, and finally crusaders. Thus 
in 1200 came Bishop Albert, with twenty- three shiploads of knights, 
organized into an order called "Brothers of the Sword," or Livonian 
Knights. They converted the heathen natives and subdued the 
land by force, making a place for the colonists, whose settlements 
have remained distinct to this day. This order of knights suf- 
fered severe defeat in 1236 and thereupon united with the Teutonic 
Knights, another order devoted to forcible Christianization. The 
struggle with the natives of the Baltic Provinces was then renewed. 
During the 14th century, and again in the 16th century,' there was a 
series of religious wars ; the religious orders were weakened, and their 
territory was overrun by Poles and Swedes. After 1561, Poland held 
southern Lettland, and Courland became a Polish duchy. Amid 



Land Tenure and Trade Outlets in Esthonia and Latvia 363 




Limudnidiis ^^^ Poles 

^ White Russians IVjLjj Germans 

I'-"'"'"! Russians 

— —Presen't Boundaries 

».__Probable •> 

Plebiscite' n 

Provincial » 

60 80 



Fig. 184. Ethnography and boundaries in Lithuania and in the former Baltic Provinces of 
Russia. The eastern boundary of Lithuania as shown above represents the line established by 
treaty between Lithuania and the Soviet government (1920). It may be altered as a result 
of the occupation of Vilna by Polish irregular troops, which has led to a decision to hold a pleb- 
iscite to determine whether the Vilna region shall belong to Poland or to Lithuania. 

all these and later changes the Prussian landlords kept their pohtical 
hold upon the country, and with it their control of the land and the 
means of commerce. 

In 1629 Sweden, under Gustavus Adolphus, got control of Lettland, 
to give way in turn to Russia in 1721, in the time of Peter the Great. 
Under the Swedish rule of ahnost a hundred years (1629-1721) many 



364 



The New World 



Swedish 
liberality 
in con- 
trast to 
Russian 
oppression 



Forcible 
Russifica- 
tion of the 
people 



Disorders 
accompany- 
ing the 
revolution 
of 1905 



A great 
coloniza- 
tion 
scheme 



of the Prussia;! landlords had to give up their estates. The people 
were able also to maintain schools. But under the Russian rule that 
followed, all the privileges of government were returned to the Ger- 
man lords. Churches, schools, and police laws were under their con- 
trol, and they made the fullest use of their opportunity. The peas- 
ants were made serfs, which practically meant slaves. They could 
be sold or given away; the lords had the power of life and death 
over them. Not until 1804 could the peasants own property or land. 
But the granting of this right of ownership accomplished little. 
The landlords obtained still more land until, by 1850, they owned 60 
per cent of the whole. Between 1845 and 1863 laws were promulgated 
by the Russian government which Kmited the rights of the landlords, 
and since that time the peasants have been able to obtain a fresh 
hold upon the soil. 

In 1884, with the active cooperation of the German landlords, the 
government of the Czar began a Russianizing policy which continued 
until the revolution of 1905. The Russian language was prescribed 
in the schools, in the University of Dorpat, and in the whole civil 
administration. German support of these measures tended to increase 
the differences between the peasants and the German barons ; be- 
cause the pastors were German, congregations refused to attend 
church or were disorderly during services. At last there was a settled 
determination to develop a nationaUstic movement, which, should it 
succeed, would rid the people of the German barons and of the auto- 
cratic rule of Russia. 

In 1905 sociaUsm spread rapidly in the general effort to overthrow 
the existing government, and many of the estates of the • German 
landlords were seized. The Russian government put down the 
revolution with great vigor and brutality. From that time until the 
formation of repubhcan governments in 1919, the Germans on the one 
hand and the Russians on the other were equally hated by the Esths 
and Letts. 

It was the presence of the German barons in the Baltic Provinces 
that led Germany to hope for the conquest of this country early in 
1918, when the German army completed its advance of the last months 
of 1917 and established itself on a line which it held down to the end 
of the war. By the treaty of Brest-Litovsk (between Germany and 
Russia, in 1918), all the country west of the line shown on Figure 180 
was to be made into states whose government and economic control 
were to be in the hands of German princes. The German government 
also organized a great colonization scheme, advertising large estates 



Land Tenure and Trade Outlets in Esthonia and Latvia 365 

that were made vacant by the flight of Lettish peasants. It was 
called the Hindenburg Colonization Plan. Every Courland land- 
owner whose estate exceeded a certain figure had to sell one third 
of it to the land company, which itself fixed the purchase price, if 
necessary by compulsory auction. 

GERMAN ATTEMPTS TO RETAIN CONTROL 

For more than a year after the war closed, the fate of the region German 
was in the balance. By an unfortunate article in the armistice of evacuating 
11 November 1918, Germany was required to remove her troops from the Baltic 

Provinces 

the Baltic Provinces only when ordered by the Allies to do so. A 
long delay ensued. This gave the army leaders and the power- 
ful German land-owning barons, or Baits, who had controlled the 
country for centuries, an opportunity to interfere with the newly 
formed and weak governments of Esthonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. 
Von der Goltz, the German army commander, supported by soldiers 
of fortune from Germany and the local German nobility, tried to 
bring the whole Baltic region under German control, intending thus 
to hold the Baltic outlets of a vast hinterland and provide a base for 
German economic and political penetration of Russia. 

Several times, as a result of Allied pressure, the German armies Country 
withdrew over limited areas and permitted the Bolshevists to come tyOer- 
in and work their will on the defenseless inhabitants. They stripped ^^^^ and 
the country of every useful object, as well as of food ; agricultural 
machinery, factory equipment, beds, upholstery, etc., were carried 
away. By this action, Von der Goltz and the nobles created a still 
wider gulf between the native Lettish peasants and the German land- 
owners ; instead of increasing German influence, they put an end to 
it. The result was open conflict, destined to throw out finaUy and 
completely the remnants of German power and to free the region 
from a control that had lasted for eight centuries. Under the super- 
vision of an Interallied military mission, the evacuation of the Ger- 
man armies was completed late in 1919, but the mission would prob- 
ably not have succeeded at all if a strong Allied blockade had not 
been maintained for several months on the Baltic coast of Germany. 

THE BASIS OF THE NEW STATES 

Pohtical power in the three former provinces at last has passed into Weakness 

the hands of two national assemblies. These are inexperienced bodies, ^onai as- 

and it remains to be seen whether they can form strong governments. sembUes 
Tacit recognition of Esthonia and Latvia — and at the same time 



366 



The New World 




Fig. 185. Part of the harbor of Riga. 



limwn Bros. 



of Lithuania (page 362) — was accorded in 1919 by the Peace Con- 
ference of Paris in deahng with the delegations from these states. 
Poland recognized Latvia in October 1919, and agreed to help her 
against the Bolshevists. A treaty was made at Riga late in 1919 
between Esthonia and Latvia which provided for : 

(1) The division of military forces on the frontier opposed to the 
Bolshevists, including agreements about militEiry supplies. 

(2) The demarcation of the Lettish-Esthonian boundary. 



Treaty of 
Dorpat, 
between 
Esthonia 
and Russia 



AGREEMENT WITH THE PRESENT GOVERNMENT OF RUSSIA 

Having obtained recognition from the AUies, it was important for 
Esthonia to arrange peace with Soviet Russia, so that industries could 
be revived, order maintained, and an eastern administrative boundary 
established. 

As a result of a conference at Dorpat an armistice was concluded 
on 3 January 1920 between the Esths and the government of Soviet 
Russia, the Esths obtaining practically the whole of the territory they 
claimed on ethnic grounds. 

(1) Article I of the treaty announces the cessation of hostilities 
and the conclusion of peace between the two countries. 

(2) The Russian government recognizes the right of a nationality 
within the former Russian Empire to separate from Russia 



Land Tenure and Trade Outlets in Esthonia and Latvia 367 

and to enjoy absolute independence, basing this action on 
the principle of self-determination; it therefore renounces 
voluntarily and forever all sovereign rights over Esthonian 
people and territory. The frontiers are defined as shown in 
Figure 184. 

(3) It is further provided that no armed vessels shall be kept on 
Lakes Peipus and Pskov. Guarantees are given to disarm 
military and naval units of other powers that may be on the 
soil of Esthonia or of Russia. Direct telegraphic connection 
is established between Wesenberg in Esthonia on the one 
hand and Petrograd and Moscow on the other, as well as with 
Pskov, which is the headquarters of a mixed commission to 
carry out the military guarantees. 

(4) Russia renounces all claims to former Russian property, money, 
etc., located in Esthonia, and agrees to pay to Esthonia 
15,000,000 rubles in gold. 

(5) Esthonia has no responsibility for Russian debts or other ob- 
ligations created by the issue of paper money, etc., and the 
Russian government undertakes to restore to Esthonia valuables 
of all kinds that were taken away from the country. 

(6) Of particular interest is the section of the treaty dealing with 
economic relations, providing for the equality of trade in 
commercial, industrial, and financial enterprises, ships and 
cargoes, farms and industries, agricultural products and ex- 
ported goods. "No customs duties or tariffs shall be levied 
on goods transported across the territory of the other sig- 
natory of this treaty." Freight rates are to be no higher 
in one country than in the other country, for goods of the 
same nature over the same distance. Esthonia is to provide 
Russia with whatever port space is needed for commercial 
purposes, with a free port in Revel, or wherever a free port 
may be established. 

(7) Special agreements must be made between Esthonia and 
Russia for any artificial diversion of the water from Lakes 
Peipus and Pskov which may lower the average level of the 
water of these lakes by more than one foot, and in a similar 
way fishing on the two lakes and the operation of commer- 
cial vessels are to be regulated. 

(8) Russia is to have the right to obtain electric power from the 
waterfalls of the Narova River, and Esthonia is to have the 
right to construct and exploit a direct single- or double-track 
railway connection from Moscow to some point on the Es- 
thonian frontier. 

(9) Finally, Russia grants to Esthonia rights over 2,700,000 acres 
of forest land in the governments of Petrograd, Pskov, Tver, 
Novgorod, Olonetz, Vologda, and Archangel. 



368 



The New World 



The new 
states an 
agricultural 
region with 
little m- 
dustry 



These provisions are, on the whole, surprisingly liberal to Esthonia, 
and, if carried out, will assure her a favorable basis for her economic 
life. If the Soviet government should be overthrown, the agreement 
is of interest as forming the probable basis of a new treaty, though 
the items mentioned in paragraphs 8 and 9, above, are likely to be 
modified in Russia's favor. 

INTERNAL AFFAIRS 

In both area and population the two new Baltic states are small : 



Esthonia 
Latvia 



Area 
20,000 sq. mi. 
25,000 sq. mi. 



Population 

1,750,000 
2,400,000 



Only a small part of the population is engaged in transportation 
and commerce, and another equally small part is engaged in industrial 
occupations. The chief basis of life is agriculture, which furnishes 
employment for more than half the population. While the hold- 
ing of land in large estates enabled the German landowners to exploit 
the peasants, it is also true that these landowners formed the most 
intelligent part of the population and were responsible for the intro- 
duction of modern agricultural machinery and diversified farming. 
In Esthonia the Germans constituted 13 per cent of the total popu- 
lation and owned about 50 per cent of the land. The peasants have 
won freedom from the Baits, but they have lost an important part 
of the brains of the country. While both states have been repeatedly 
overrun by armies during the war, Latvia was almost destroyed. It 
is estimated that in the district of Courland the decrease in population 
from 1914 to 1917 was from 800,000 to 300,000. 

As for internal poUtical and economic problems, they relate prin- 
cipally to the land question. All parties are agreed that the land 
should be divided among the people, that church and state should be 
separated, and that the form of government should be liberal. While 
opposed to Bolshevism, Latvia is a socialistic state. The economic 
condition of the region is not favorable. A large part of the 
country is forested, and there is not a closely organized commer- 
cial life. Transportation, except along the few railways, is still prim- 
itive and slow. As late as 1911 Esthonia had no paved roads at all. 

Esthonia and Latvia would be strengthened commercially if they 
were to form an economic union and include Lithuania. The po- 
litical obstacle to such a union is the lack of sympathy between the 
different elements. They have different languages and have no close 



Land Tenure and Trade Outlets in Esthonia and Latvia 369 

historical or political associations, in spite of the similarity of their 
social and political problems in the past. Such a combination might 
also enable the German barons to regain political control ; being 
more experienced in commercial and political affairs, they could play 
one nationality against the other to their own advantage. 

INTERNATIONAL POSITION OF ESTHONIA AND LATVIA 

The importance of the region in international affairs springs from The Baltic 
the fact that the ports of the Baltic — Riga, Libau, Windau, and jSa^' 
Baltic Port — are the rail outlets for a large part of interior Russia, outlets for 
and all have an important conunercial rank; Riga, the largest, is materkis 
sixth in importance among the ports of Russia. Also, the exports o^^ large 
are raw materials — like flax and wood — and these are of importance 
to the industrialized nations of western Europe, whose own produc- 
tion of such materials is small and who must find additional stocks 
on or near a seaboard, where water transportation assures low freight 
rates. 

The recognition of the two governments of Esthonia and Latvia Great 
by Great Britain has a commercial significance, not only in respect Baitk^^r 
of the future of Russia, but with reference to general imperial policy in harmony 
and understandings with the French. It appears to be understood tJLditionof 
that the Baltic Sea is a British trade realm in which there will be im- ^o^stai 
portant developments in the future. Thus it was the British navy 
that blockaded the coasts of Germany and Soviet Russia. A British 
High Commissioner sits at Danzig, and British naval units have pa- 
trolled the coast of the Baltic and guaranteed the safety of com- 
mercial exchange. AU this is in line with the British traditional 
policy of establishing influence or control in ports and coastal belts 
serving as outlets for interior populations from which flow important 
currents of trade. 



CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO 



FINNISH PROBLEMS IN THEIR GEOGRAPHICAL SETTING 



Treaty of 
Dorpat 



Finland to 
have an 
Arctic 

warm-water 
port 



Finland's chief territorial problem lies on her eastern frontier, long 
in dispute with Soviet Russia. The main points in contention were 
the question of an outlet for Finland on the Arctic Ocean (Pechenga 
region) and the disposition of eastern Kareha, a province occupied 
by a people racially allied to the Finns. An agreement was finally 
reached in a treaty signed 14 October 1920 and ratified 29 December 
1920. The boundary articles of the treaty of Dorpat assign to Fin- 
land a strip of the Arctic coast and connecting territory as shown in 
the inset of Figure 188 ; and other articles provide for the neutraliza- 
tion of the frontier. The treaty also guarantees autonomy to eastern 
Karelia and to the Karelian population of Archangel and Olonetz 
(northeast of Lake Ladoga), which is Greek Orthodox in religion and 
Russian in civilization and has no marked political preference. 
Transportation and rafting of timber on waters crossing the boundary 
line is to be permitted to both countries. Commercial freedom of 
wide scope is guaranteed in articles on the use of ports, railways, 
telegraph lines, freight and customs rates, on fishing rights, harbor 
fees, and the like. 

The Pechenga region which Finland gained is a small, barren strip 
on the Arctic shore. Its significance arises out of the tempering 
eff'ect exercised by a branch of the warmer waters of the north 
Atlantic drift (usually called the Gulf Stream), whereby the ports of 
Pechenga and Alexandrovsk, 250 miles north of the Arctic Circle 
(Fig. 186), remain open throughout the winter months, when all the 
ports of the eastern Baltic and the White Sea are closed by ice. 
Archangel is icebound for nine months each year. It was to secure 
an open port that Russia built the Murman railway to Catherine 
Harbor (Alexandrovsk). The northern ports would be of far less 
importance if it were not that Russia has already lost all her Baltic 
ports except Petrograd and may lose others on the Black Sea and 
in eastern Siberia. 



GEOGRAPHICAL CONDITIONS 

Of all of the new nations of Europe, Finland is farthest north. 
What are its resources ? What is the physical basis of its strength ? 

As outlined in Figure 186, Finland is a third as large as Ontario. 
While the extreme north grades into Arctic tundra, the country as a 

370 



Finnish Problems in their Geographical Setting 371 



whole resembles the Lake Superior region in surface and climate. 
Everywhere the surface is rocky and lake-dotted, with an irregular 
drainage, a thin soil, and an extensive forest cover. In the milder 
south, where there is a deeper soil, there are farms producing hardy 
grains like rye, barley, and oats. 

The population of Finland is 3,500,000. Helsingfors, the capital, Distribu- 
has 187,000. The towns are smaU, and include only 15 per cent of pop"Jition 
the population (in the United States 
about half the population is ur- 
ban) . In the cold and remote north 
the density of population is less 
than 1 to the square mile ; but in 
the warmer and more fertile south, 
on the edge of the Gulf of Finland, 
it reaches 93 to the square mile. 

Half of the population lives by 
agriculture and cattle raising, but 
only 8.5 per cent of the land is 
cultivated or used for pastiu-e. 
Nearly a third of the surface is 
covered with peat marsh and bog, 
and nearly half is forested. Barley 
is grown up to latitude 68° north 
and rye to 64°, or to 67° in favora- 
ble years. The farther north one 
goes the longer — and also the 
hotter — the summer days ; and 




Lessthanl 1 -10 10-25 over 25 percq.km. 



Less1hanZ,£ 2.G-26 ZG-G4- overG4 persq.mi. 



whereas barley takes 116 days to Fig. 186. Population densities for Finland. 
,■1 ii 1T1 1 l^ Note the coastal position of the highest den- 

ripen m the Aland Islands, there are ^^y grades and compare with Figure i89, 

but 63 days between sowing and showing the field of Swedish colonization. 
. I'l Based on Petermanns Mittcilungen, 1913, 1, PI. 

harvest m the higher latitudes, 2, and Debes, Handatlas, 1913, PI. 12 c. 

the limit of its range. 

No other civilized race lives so far north as the people of Finland. 
''The Finns have been bred in the school of adversity." As a whole 
the country is poor and famines are not rare. In 1867, for example, 
there was a fearful dearth, owing chiefly to the poor crop of rye, the 
principal food. Again in 1869 there was general want, due to the 
partial failure of the potato crop. The Finns have emigrated in large 
numbers, chiefly to North America, for Finland cannot support its 
people on its own produce. 

The chief wealth of Finland lies in its forests and its water power. 



Crop fail- 
ures and 
famines 



372 



The New World 



Forests, 
water 
power, and 
railroads 



Inland 
water sys- 
tem of 
Finland 



WATER POWER 

AND 

DRAINAGE 

» 2,000-10,000 HP. 
© over 10,000 H P. 

(at mean low watSr) 
Group of rapids., 

each over 10,000 H.P 

(Numerals indicate 
number of rapids grouped' 
Jf(/ Lakes and expanded 

stream courses 



Of the 3,000,000 horse power available, only 100,000 are now in use. 
In 1913, wood and wood products formed 15 per cent of the ex- 
ports of the country. Mineral resources are almost unknown. The 
total mileage of railways is 2500, which, in relation to the number of 
people, is a high figure and compares favorably with that of industrial 
countries hke France and Belgium. In relation to area, the railway 

mileage is small. The 
long and indented sea- 
coast, with innumera- 
ble havens and exten- 
sive fishing grounds, 
has naturally bred sail- 
ors. Before the World 
War, Finnish ships plied 
between Stockholm, 
Antwerp, London, 
Havre, and Bordeaux. 

For the most part 
settlements in Finland 
follow the watercourses, 
just as they did in the 
Stone Age, because these 
are the natural ready- 
made means of com- 
munication. Finland 
has forty times as much 
inland water as France. 
Certain canals date 
from the Middle Ages. 
The Saima Canal con- 

PiG. 187. Water resources of FinlaiK^, a glaciated rocky country nCCtS lakcS of the Saima 

like Quebec. The Saima canal system, mentioned in the text, , V. ' Vi 

is shown just above Kotka on the Gulf of Finland. Yvova. Atlas SyStCm, WUICU COVCrS 

de FwiZande, 2d ed., 1911, PI. 14. 2600 squarc milcs of 

water, the largest lake group in Europe, of which more than 2000 
square miles are in Finland (Fig. 187). This system connects directly 
with the GuK of Finland and is an outlet of incalculable benefit to 
the country. 

THE PEOPLE OF FINLAND 

The Finns The Finns are closely allied to the Esthonians and the Letts on the 

predomi- Baltic ; that is, they belong to the Finno-Ugrian stock, which is quite 

distinct from the Slavic stock of eastern Europe and from the Teu- 




Finnish Problems in their Geographical Setting 373 



tonic (Nordic) stock of Scandinavia and Germany. Finnish is the lan- 
guage of 88 per cent of the population ; more than 1 1 per cent speak 
Swedish. Though small numerically, the Swedish element is very 
important because it controls a large part of the wealth of the coun- 
try and is active poUtically out of proportion to its numbers. The 
small remainder of the people comprises about 1300 Lapps in the north 
and about 2000 Germans and 6000 Russians in the southern portions. 

Education in Fin- 
land is on a remarka- 
bly high level. Prac- 
tically every Finlander 
can read. There are 
two universities, Hel- 
singfors and Abo. Fin- 
land has one of the 
two geographical asso- 
ciations in the world 
that admit to member- 
ship only geographers 
who have done original 
work. 

The discovery by 
Elias Lonnrot of the 
great epic of the Finns, 
the Kalevala, first pub- 
fished jn 1835, gave a 
great impulse to the 
study of the Finnish 
language and culture. 
More than 300,000 
legends, sagas, and 
proverbs have been 
collected. 

All this intellectual 
activity, but especially 
the publication of the Kalevala, has had a strongly stimulating effect 
on the nationalist movement and has brought the Finnish element of 
the population to the front. Despite the difficulties of her geograph- 
ical environment and of ever-threatening trouble from the east, Fin- 
land has risen to the rank of a nation of great promise for the future 
— an outpost of western civilization. 




Fig. 188. The Karelians, though Finns, Tiave many Russian 
characteristics. Were they added to Finlanrl, that country's 
eastern boundary would be the White Sea. It is through the 
territory of the Karelians that the Russians have built the 
railway to Kola (K on the map) and Alexandrovsk (A). 
Based on Atlas de Finlande, 2d ed., 1911, PI. 46, and Debes, 
Handatlas, 1913, PI. 12 c. The inset shows the final bound- 
ary of Finland in the Pechenga district (page 370). Pechenga 
is shown by a small circle on the inset, and two fine parallel 
lines locate the road now running to that port, which will 
probably soon be served by a railway. 



374 The Neiv World 



RELATION TO NEIGHBORING STATES 

Finland's Finland's present problems in the field of political geography follow 

^^°^ for the most part from the country's position between more powerful 
peoples of different race and speech — the Swedes on the west and the 
Russians on the east. Here, as elsewhere, the ruling pohtical philos- 
ophy of the past has brought the heel of the conqueror on the neck 
of the small nation that stood in the path of empire. In the 12th 
and 13th centuries the Swedes, after repeated crusades against the 
country, conquered it ; and they kept it until 1809 — more than six 
hundred years. During this time the history of Sweden is the history 
of Finland. The whole country was impregnated with Swedish 
culture. Then came Russia. 

Through four centuries Russia has consistently extended her frontiers 
on all sides toward open water, that is, toward the Baltic and Black 
seas, the Pacific, the Mediterranean, and the Persian Gulf. Her 
rulers have made this the main national political objective through- 
out the two centuries since the time of Peter the Great. Finland 
stood in her path. So Finland was conquered by the Russians during 
the Napoleonic wars and was held by them down to 1917, when the 
Czar was deposed and the Russian democratic government set up. 

By the treaty of Fredrikshamn, in 1809, Russia, gaining control 
of Finland, agreed to respect its independence ; but, as with all auto- 
cratic governments, the word of a treaty proved to be a thing easily 
broken when it suited the ruler's purpose to break it. How artificial 
was the process of Russification may be seen by the fact that Russian 
culture, after a century of artificial stimulation, is practically non- 
existent in Finland today. 
Aland Is- In the alternate ownership of Finland by Sweden and Russia, the 

iource^f Aland Islands have been a matter of dispute. They lie only seventy- 
dispute five miles from Stockholm and twenty miles from the Swedish coast, 
Sweden and if fortificd by a neighboring power would be a grave menace, 
and Fin- Their strategic value grows out of their good harbors as well as their 
geographical position. They were ceded by Sweden to Russia in 
1809, but their population of 19,000 is almost exclusively Swedish. 
They have been recommended for assignment to Finland by the com- 
mission of the League of Nations that was appointed to study the 
Aland question. 

Fortunately for the Finns, the Alhes maintained a military front 
in northern Russia through 1918 and 1919. The Archangel sector 
protected Finland's flank, thus enabling the Finnish armies to hold 



Finnish Problems in their Geographical Setting 375 




The pro- 
tection of 
the Allies 



in check the Bolshevist 
troops based on Petro- 
grad. Thereby the 
country was enabled to 
right itself, after sev- 
eral brief internal strug- 
gles between the 
"Whites" and "Reds" 
which ended in quali- 
fied victory for the 
"Whites." This out- 
come put at least a 
temporary end to Bol- 
shevism in Finland, won 
recognition and assist- 

p xV. All* J •^^^- ^^^' Swedish colonists, former Swedish ownership of 

ance irom tne Allies, and Finland, and the wide distribution of Swedish culture have 

Started the country on «?mbined to make the Swedes a powerful political group in 

•^ Fmland. From Atlas de Fmlande, 2d ed., 1911, Vol. II, p. 20, 

its national career. text to map 46. 

THE OUTLOOK FOR FINLAND 

Communist agitation still continues among the soldiers of the regu- whites and 
lar army, and together with Bolshevist propaganda has undermined ^^^^ 
the morale of the army to some extent. The bitterness that arose in 
the civil war of 1919 has continued, and adds its problem to that of 
the contest between the working classes and the rest of the popu- 
lation, particularly the bourgeoisie. The conservative part of the 
population fears Red disturbances, and the Reds fear that the Whites 
will set up a reactionary government. The progress of the settlement 
and unification of the pohtical life of the country is made more diffi- 
cult by proximity to Soviet Russia. 

The strong racial differences between Finns and Russians, the 
long pohtical oppression' of the Finns by the former Russian gov- 
ernment, and lately the evil effects of Bolshevism, will limit the re- 
lations of the Finns and Russians for many years to come, even in tionai 
commercial matters. Of pohtical union or confederation there can 
be none at all. Finland and Sweden having had the friendly assist- 
ance of the League of Nations in the settlement of the Aland Islands 
dispute, the bond between these two states ought to become as strong 
as will be, in time, that with the Esths and Letts. In short, the ex- 
ternal political problems of Finland are relatively simple ; her chief 
danger lies in the radical elements within her borders and the difficulties 
that naturally attend development of a strong democratic government. 



Finland's 
problems 
chiefly do- 
mestic, not 



CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE 

THE POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY OF RUSSIA 

Russia: an A DRAMATIC theme of Statesmen and publicists for many years before 
adJance ^^^^' Worlcl War was the growing danger of absorption of neighboring 
lands and people by the huge Russian Empire. British statesmen were 
anxiously contemplating every Russian advance in Central Asia. 
By 1893, Russia's frontier almost touched British India at Kashmir 
in the Pamirs ; and Russian poUtical agents were scattered through 
the distant Chinese provinces of Eastern Turkestan, Mongolia, and 
Tibet, as well as in Persia, Turkey, and Afghanistan. It was the 
steady growth of Russian influence in Manchuria and elsewhere in 
northern China that led to the Russo-Japanese War in 1905. The 
Russification of Congress Poland continued from 1815 down to the 
opening of the World War, and German leaders never allowed their 
people to forget the menace of the Slav. In 1907 the constitutional 
guarantees of the Finns were set aside. Russian influence was aggres- 
sive in northern Turkey ^- on the borders of Transcaucasia — and in 
both Persia and Turkey toward the Persian Gulf, whither Russia sought 
a railway outlet to warm water. With a strongly centralized govern- 
ment, Russia had been able persistently to absorb or penetrate those 
border regions of chief strategic importance in commerce and war. 

The break-up of the Russian Empire now seems a rather natural 
event, seeing how diverse were its various parts in customs, ideals, 
ethnography, history, and mode of life. The apparent harmony of 
the political map was merely the expressitm of centralized imperial 
power exercised upon an ignorant peasantry. Just as soon as indus- 
tries developed trained men and educational facilities, the old system 
failed, not so much because it was ill-adapted to modern needs, as 
because it ceased to function, particularly in the World War. First 
came the democratic revolution of 1917, and second the general dis- 
integration of political life as a consequence of the rise and spread 
of Bolshevist philosophy and power. 

In its present fragmented condition and state of disorder, will Russia 
be able to gather itself together again and form a unified government ? 
We shall be able to estimate the chance of such reorganization only 
if we know, first of all, what peoples composed the empire, what diver- 
gencies existed among them, and finally what geographical, political, 
social, economic, or religious bonds may now be made to serve as uni- 
fying principles. Consideration will first be given to ethnic character. 

376 



The Political Geography of Rifssia 



377 




ti ~ tn .2 

5 S £ 3 
>'i £ ^ 

g^ ^^ 
■■g ^ O O 

.2 ^ ^ ^ 

-2 S'.S 2 
X^ "" >- d 

^ H> -^ J, 



W O) o 

_, -1-) 0; CO 

•2 " " § 

--0 CI £3 

^ M 0) •-< 

.2 03 C5 .. 

.5m „7? 



PQ o 



a o 

W (» 






0) 


r1 


o 




qil 










T) 




TJ 




03 


_c 


o 


T3 


2 


bl) 


o 


CI 
CS 

.2 

aJ 

13 




o 

M 

o 


1 

CQ 

§ 




jO 


^ 


m 





03 


01 
0) 






>, 




ft 


1 




03 


01 

H 


O 


O 














ii 




F1 




a 


Bl 


CI 


cl 


OJ 




.9* 


5 

.a 


03 


=§ 
3 


&^ 




m 


H 




bll 




01 




43 


-T< 


C! 

m 




tl' 


H 


T) 


73 

3 


a 


1 




ACQ 


o 


o 










05 


. 


r, 


m 


n 


• ' 


03 


o 


3 


0) 


6 


Ii 


^ 


a 


bll 

IH 












PuPHOofUpq 



378 The New World 

THE ETHNIC GROUPS OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE 

Attitude Of the many ethnic groups comprised in the table on page 379, 

il^r^^^' ^^ ^^^ *^^* ^^^ starred represent peoples that were the chief 

peoples internal cause of border insecurity. Each one wished to stand by 

nSa itself as an independent or at least autonomous power, or to ally 

itself with a neighboring country which it regarded as the homeland 

of its people. Pohtical self-consciousness and power of organization 

were of a low order among the Lithuanians, Letts, Esthonians, and 

Georgians, but were more strongly felt on grounds of tradition and 

history in the case of the Poles. Wlien the new democratic regime 

began in Russia with the overthrow of the Czar (1917), all these 

groups set to work to organize their national life, establish agencies 

of government, and secure the recognition and assistance of the 

western European powers. 

The historical enmity between Poles and Russians, as well as the 
memory of former Polish greatness, made it impossible for Poland 
to be considered as a part of any future Russian state. Likewise, 
the Finns, because of the differences between them and the Russians 
as well as their historical enmity, were set apart as a lost element. 
Gradually, too, the Esths, Letts, and Lithuanians sought to establish 
a new order in which they should have relief from the German land- 
holder, who had held them virtually as serfs down to the present 
time. In addition there was the, Ukrainian movement, which sought 
to detach from the Russian Empire its richest and most densely popu- 
lated part, the section best served by railroads. To permit the 
Ukraine to form an independent government would be to throw all 
the rest of the vast Russian Empire into a state of economic depend- 
ence, seeing that the interior would be shut off more completely 
than ever from the sea, whereas improved access to the sea has been 
one of the historical and vital aims of Russia. 
Weak As for the remaining non-Russian ethnic groups in the former em- 

eastern pire, some of them represent negligible elements and others elements 
elements ^f grave weakness. For example, the more primitive Siberian tribes 
lack political self-consciousness, and their geographical position and 
environment have imposed a low standard of life. Their commer- 
cial activity is feeble, and they play no vital part in the reconstruc- 
tion of Russia. On the other hand, some of the rather primitive 
groups in Turkestan, on the shores of the Black Sea, and in the region 
east of the Volga, are Moslems whose religious attachments are with 
Tm*key and the rest of the Moslem world, and whose self-conscious- 



The Political Geography of Russia 



379 



Ethnic Composition of the Russian Empire according to the Census of 1897, 

AND within the BOUNDARIES OF 1914. 

(Figures represent thousands. Names of loosely attached border peoples arc starred.) 



ARYANS 

Slavs 

Great Russians 

Little Russians* 

White Russians 

Poles * . 

Other Slavs 
Lithuanians* 
Letts* . . 
Iranians 
Armenians* 
Rumanians* 
Germans . 
Swedes . . 
Other Aryans 
SEMITES . . . 
URALO-ALTAIANS 
Finno-Ugrians 

Finns* 

Karelians .... 

Lapps 

Mordvinians . . 

Other Finno-Ugrians . 

Esthonians* .... 
Turko-Tatars* 

Kirghiz 

Tatars 

Bashkirs 

Sarts 

Chuvashes .... 

Uzbegs 

Turkomans .... 

Osmanli Turks . . . 

Other Turko-Tatars . 
Mongols . . ... . 

Other Uralo-Altaians 
GEORGIANS* .... 

OTHER CAUCASIANS 
HYPERBOREANS . . 
CHINESE, JAPANESE 

TOTALS .... 



Russia 

IN 

Europe 


Poland 


Caucasia 


Siberia 


Central 
Asia 


Finland 


48,559 


267 


1,830 


4,424 


588 


6 


20,415 


335 


1,305 


223 


102 




5,823 


29 


20 


12 


1 




1,110 


6,756 


25 


29 


12 




213 


7 


4 








1,345 


305 


5 


2 


1 




1,422 


5 


2 


7 


1 




2 




418 




364 




77 




1,096 




5 




1,122 


5 


7 








1,312 


407 


57 


5 


9 


2 


14 










350 


132 


1 


105 


6 


1 




3,715 


1,267 


40 


33 


8 




143 










2,353 


208 












2 










1 


990 






21 


13 




1,090 






32 






990 


A^ 


4 


4 






264 






33 


3,989 




1,953 


,1, 


1,510 


210 


60 




1,488 




1 


1 


3 
968 




838 


1 




4 


726 




8 




25 




219 




69 




139 












205 


227 


623 




171 




14 


289 






4 




1,352 
1,092 


82 

39 
86 






93,479 


9,393 


9,256 


5,769 


7,723 


2,712 



TOTALB 



55,674 

22,380 

5,885 

7,932 

224 

1,658 

1,437 

784 

1,178 

1,134 

1,792 

364 

245 

5,063 



2,496 
208 
3 
1,024 
1,122 
1,002 

4,286 

3,737 

1,493 

968 

843 

726 

282 

208 

1,055 

474 

86 

1,352 

1,092 

39 

86 



128,332 



ness has been raised to the rank of a poHtical force by the progress of 
the Pan-Islamic and the Pan-Turanian movements. The Armenians 
and Georgians ai*e each seeking national independence ; they will not 
find it easy to associate themselves with any government formed far 
north of the Caucasus. 



380 



The New World 




Fig. 191. Generalized ethnographic map of Russia in relation to the boundaries of the larger nat- 
ural regions. Ethnography after Debes and natural regions after map by Hanelik in Rudnyckyj, 
Der Ostliche Kriegesschauplatz, 1915. For population density and explanation of cities see Fig- 
ure 198. Smaller ethnographic elements, like the Lapps in the north and the Kirghiz about the 
eastern and northern Caspian, are not shown. "Caucasian" refers to locality, not race. Note 
the close approach of the bends of the Volga and Don near Tsaritsyn. The Cossacks of the Don, 
the partly nomadic lOrghiz east of them, and the Tatars of Azerbaijan about Baku constitute a 
broad belt of non- Russian population with separatist tendencies, encircling the Caspian- 



The Jew- 
ish prob- 
lem 



Within the so-called Jewish Pale, shown on Figure 192, are more 
than 5,000,000 Jews. Though they were in general prohibited from 
living in Great Russia, this prohibition did not actually affect the 
wealthiest and best educated, who are scattered throughout the 



TJie Political Geography of Russia 



381 




Fig. 192. The Pale of Settlement, western European Russia, according to the Jewish En- 
cyclopcBdia (article on Russia). In none of the Russian governments without shading on the 
map do the Jews form as much as 1 per cent of the total population, except in the Baltic region, 
where percentages of Jews are given in figures (1, 2, 7). 

country, while still being chiefly settled in Lithuania, Courland, the 
Ukraine, and Bessarabia. In Russian Poland, Jews constitute 14 per 
cent of the total population, and in Bessarabia about 12 per cent, 
though from 30 to 60 per cent of them are in the cities. 

It is characteristic of the Jews that they have a conmiunity hfe 
distinct from that of the people about them, and they have grown 
so numerous as to become an object of persecution throughout Rus- 
sia, under the new regime as well as the old. The antipathy toward 
them is not wholly because of their religion ; it is aroused partly by 
their success in business, particularly in money-lending. Many of 
them take no interest whatever in political affairs, or limit their activ- 



382 



The New World 



Scattered 

German 

colonies 



ities to the gaining of privileges as a distinct race. The Jews form 
an element of weakness rather than of strength in the development of 
a unified Russian state. 

Of greater pohtical importance are the Germans who have come 
into the Baltic Provinces, forming the landlord, tradesman, and ar- 
tisan classes. They five mainly in the larger towns, whither they 
were first invited as early as the 16th century by the Russian gov- 
ernment, Russia then lacking artisans and traders. In 1762 numbers 
of them were invited to settle in southern Russia in separate agricul- 
tural colonies, and, as shown in Figure 100, they now occupy im- 
portant geographical positions in the Don region and the northern 
Caucasus. They have increased the economic value of the regions 
in which they dwell, profiting by the allotment of rich land origi- 
nally granted to them, their exemption from military service, and 
the advantages of local self-government. In the Ukraine they exer- 
cised a strong political influence during the Ukrainian separatist 
movement (beginning in 1918), and wherever located they are a 
firm basis of German economic and pohtical penetration. 



Character 
and high 
ideals lack- 
ing in the 
" old re- 
gime " 



Religious 
and eco- 
nomic 
bonds of 
the Rus- 
sian peas- 
ant 



THE DEFECTS OF THE OLD SYSTEM 

Soil and chmate, forests and minerals, do not make an empire; 
they furnish merely the physical basis for one. While Russia before 
the World War was a big, rich country, the Czar was a weak ruler 
surrounded by selfish and reactionary advisers. The real rulers were 
the Grand Dukes, the high goverimient officials, and the nobility in 
general, who numbered about 140,000 famiUes. It was this group 
that put into motion schemes for robbing the people, for exihng to 
Siberia leaders who manifested any independence of pohtical thought ; 
and it was they who were responsible for the bad management of the 
war, when, through graft and inefficiency, miUions of Russians were 
obliged to fight under every sort of handicap. 

The hands of the rulers of Russia were in large part upheld by the 
religious sentiment of the people as expressed in their almost uni- 
versal membership in the Greek Orthodox Church and the various 
sects within it. The national church was identified with the state, 
and it became an instrument of pohtical power to serve the heads 
of the Russian government. 

Nearly 90 per cent of the people belong to the peasant class, 
and the peasant was held in economic as well as spiritual bondage 
to the pohtical forces that surrounded him. Though successive 



The Political Geography of Russia 



383 




Fig. 193. The heart of Moscow, with the buildings of the Kremlin in the background. 

efforts were made by his leaders and even, through the fitful adop- 
tion of liberal policies, by the government itself, to release him 
from serfdom and allot him land, these movements were so widely 
separated in time and so meager in results that the situation of the 
peasant improved scarcely at all. He might possess land, but he 
was still in debt to a wealthy landowner. 

In short, the Czar and his advisers and the thousands of the no- 
bihty learned that the strength of their system lay in the ignorance 
of the peasant ; their wealth and privilege were gained at the expense 
of the misery of the peasant. When the masses also learned this, 
they were not long in seeking a remedy, however drastic. Of imme- 
diate importance to them was the fact that the old regime had to go ; 
the only question was the manner of its going. 



384 The New World 



THE BACKGROUND OF RUSSIAN DISORDER 

We have touched on the weaknesses of the former Russian Empire 
for the purpose of understanding the basis of that present disorder 
which is Russia's immediate anxiety. Ry far the most serious poht- 
ico-economic problem of the present is the reconstruction of Russia. 
This would seem to be most soundly based upon the traditional and 
distinctive Russian institutions known as the zemstvos and the coop- 
erative societies. Coupled with these semi-social institutions there 
will doubtless be a central government of a hberal order. Finally, 
the whole poHtical and social structure, to succeed, must have a sohd 
industrial and financial basis. That is, the processes of reconstruction 
must follow the fines of economic development already laid down in 
Russian fife. These considerations impel us to look a fittle more 
closely at the economic tendencies of Russia just before the war. 
Former Quc of the chicf causcs of the present troubles of Russia has been 

Russia the ignorance of the masses. While many factors have contributed 
to this end, a principal one is the system of land tenure practiced in 
Russia. For generations the land has been held in large estates; 
a hundred years ago, and even later, nine tenths of it was so held. 
It was tilled by the milfions of serfs that made up the bulk of the 
population. The serfs were not only ignorant ; large numbers of them 
were indolent and of drunken habits. Their fife was extremely 
wretched. The greatness and power of the empire meant nothing to 
them. For a long time, indeed, they were slaves in fact if not in name. 
The serfs Finally, in a series of edicts dating from 1859 to 1866, Alexander 

™free" ^^ abofishcd serfdom. At the same time he divided the land into 
two parts : one part was left to the landlords ; the other was given 
to the serfs, on condition that they pay the landlords for it. To the 
peasant this arrangement looked fike robbery. Instead of solving 
the land question, it made the difficulty only more acute. 
Famines - During the next fifty years the population increased so rapidly 
?^°Rus- and the need for land became so great that the Russian peasant 
sianpeas- -yy^g q^ ^jjg verge of Starvation practically all the time. During 1890 
and 1898 there were actual famines in which thousands died of star- 
vation. 
Revoiu- Conditions such as these can be remedied only if the form and 

spirit of the government are altered by an intelligent people. Since 
in Russia the rulers were stupid and vicious and the people ignorant, 
matters became worse instead of better, and finaUy when the war 
with Japan (1904-1905) turned out badly, disturbances became 



tion of 
1905 



Tlie Political Geography of Russia 385 

general. The peasants burned many of the houses of the nobles; 
mutinies were of frequent occurrence in the army and the navy ; the 
country was in a state of semi-anarchy. 

After trying with ill success to suppress the wave of disorder, the The Duma, 
Czar at last issued a manifesto (1905) which promised freedom of paJuament 
speech and of the press ; it also created, through general elections, a 
representative assembly, or Duma, which was to have the right of 
giving final approval to all laws before they were promulgated. But 
by one means or another the powers of the Duma were taken away or 
modified, until it no longer represented the people at all. Once more 
the fight for liberty had failed. 

Imperial ambitions demanded complete political assimilation of Return of 
included peoples, and the methods followed were harsh and provoca- govem- 
tive in the extreme. Between 1907 and 1914 the old pohcy of fright- '^^^^°^^^ 
fulness continued. The Poles were treated worse than ever; from 
the Finns were taken the last vestiges of an autonomous and constitu- 
tional government. The serfs became even more discontented than 
before ; the land question was growing more and more acute. There 
was also added a new political element, the most threatening toward 
the autocratic regime of aU the forces in the empire, one that was to 
be in time a powerful element — the indu^rial classes. 

Under Count Witte, a great statesman who became minister of com- witte's 
munications in 1892, Russia had built railways. Before that time it ^^nt rf 
was almost without a railway system ; in fact, there were but six de- railways 
tached lines, serving only the principal towns. Witte argued that as ^° °^ 
the country was chiefly agricultural, it would be at the mercy of the 
big industrial nations of western Europe until it changed its ways ; 
if it was ever to be free economically, it must use its own raw mate- 
rial and labor to create manufactured wares. Witte also urged state 
protection for infant industries, encouraged foreigners to invest capital, 
and started Russia on an industrial career. 

One of the immediate consequences of Witte's poHcies was the 
rapid growth of the industrial cities. In the sixteen years foUow- 
ing 1897, Odessa, Kiev, and Kherson increased their population 55, 
150, and 40 per cent respectively. These cities are the chief centers 
of steel and iron manufacture. The manganese ores of the Caucasus, 
the oil of Baku, the platinum of the Urals, and the forests of the 
north have all been developed at a tremendous rate — tremendous, at 
least, for Russia. 

It was as natural as could be in an autocracy that the laborers, better 
organized than the peasants, more closely in touch with newspapers, 



386 



The Neil) World 




Fig. 194. The plain of the Dnieper at Kiev. 



Industrial 

middle 

class 



Low state 
of agri- 
cultural 
practice in 
relation to 
famines 



in general more intelligent, should have revolutionary theories and 
should spread them. They and the students of the universities were 
the leaders in every radical movement. Side by side with the laborers 
and as a result of the same process of industrialization, there grew 
up a middle class, which up to that time had been all but wanting 
in Russia. These were the capitaUsts and business proprietors. They 
were demanding, as time went on, a greater share in the government. 
In spite of its wealth of natural resources, in spite of the Kberation 
of the serfs and the tendency toward more liberalized forms of local 
government, the management of the Russian commonwealth was 
deplorably bad. The agricultural problem had never been thor- 
oughly studied, and no far-reaching and thoroughgoing schemes of 
agricultural reform had been worked out, to say nothing of their 



The Political Geography of Russia 387 

application. More than this, large portions of the agricultural popu- 
lation lived upon land beyond the border of the zone of dependable 
rains. In the Volga region the winters are longer and more severe 
than in the Ukraine and droughts are more common. The peas- 
ants are always in a state of misery. Here is the border zone where 
the settler is tempted to an agricultural way of life, though the 
physical environment is such that he must make intelligent and 
substantial modifications of usual farming practice in order to suc- 
ceed; his problem is similar to that of the farmer in the semi-arid 
western states of Kansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma, where by dry 
farming, with its special methods of water conservation, the dis- 
advantage of repeated drought is partly offset. 

The change from the old regime of the Czar, which ended in March The peas- 
1917, to the present communistic, or Bolshevist, regime, was not im- ^"* ^^^ .*^® 

rm r> i • ' o ' Qg'^ regime 

mediate. The first step was the organization of a provisional gov- 
ernment under Kerensky, who continued to fight with the AUies 
against Germany and Austria until his government was over- 
thrown by the Bolshevists in November 1917. It was a failing 
venture from the first. The peasant did not hate Germany and 
was not interested in the war ; he wanted land — the form of his 
government and its diplomatic and mihtary pohcies interested him 
not at all. At fu-st, he took up with the new and extreme poHcy of 
the Bolshevist leaders because they promised him land. The peasant 
would as readily have tolerated any other social or political theory. 
He has been as unwilUng to fight for Bolshevists as for the Czar. 
In this respect he is to be sharply distinguished from the proletariat, 
the laboring classes of the towns, who sought to control the masses of 
peasant folk, reorganize the social life on a communistic basis, and by 
force impose social revolution and a theoric and alien form of govern- 
ment upon the peoples of the rest of the world. The war and its 
issues were left far behind. The AUies, no more willing to accept the 
dictatorship of the Russian Bolshevists than the military dictatorship 
and Kultur of Germany, parted company with Russia and stood 
thereafter in hostile, or at least neutral, relation to its unrepresenta- 
tive government. 

BOLSHEVISM ^ 

Justifiable as the Revolution of 1917 proves to have been, Russia The poison 
is in a most unfortunate condition today because, in changing from of^o^she- 

1 The name of the present Russian government is " The Russian Sociedist Federal Soviet 
Republic." 



388 The New World 

one autocracy, that of the Czar, she has fallen into the hands of an- 
other autocracy, that of the Bolshevists, whose leaders, hke the 
three wise men of Gotham, have attempted to go to sea in a bowl : 

" 'Whither in your bowl so free?' 

'To rake the moon from out the sea.'" 

Russia's Bolshevism is the rule of society by a class, the "proletariat" ; 

losses .^g methods destroy property — they do not create it. It has done 

more harm to Russia, materially and spiritually, than the World War 
did. Many of the most intelligent people, including teachers, doctors, 
and lawyers, have been killed. Thousands have fled to France, Great 
Britain, and the United States. Many others have been so long 
underfed and terrorized that they have no spirit left for a new time of 
peace and order, even if such a time should come soon. The actors, 
the writers, the investigators, are spiritually dead. For years to come 
these men will not produce a great play, a great novel, a great news- 
paper, a great university. Bolshevism has meant a step backward 
toward the barbarism of earlier times. 
Soviet Many persons believe that nothing less than the slavery of the 

masses will result from the latest labor regulations of the Bolshevist 
leaders. An Industrial General Staff with vast powers is at the head 
of the whole industrial organization of the country. The liberty 
of labor is stated to be an impossibility in a communistic state. Mili- 
tary discipline has been adopted, and the managers of workshops, 
appointed by the government, are given military rank and almost 
unlimited powers. If they desire, authorities may transfer men from 
one industry to another ; if a worker does not lay brick to suit them, 
or handle tools to their satisfaction, he may be sent into agriculture or 
the mines. The peasants are less free than they were under the Czar. 
How the The Russian people may be sentimental and mystical, but they are 

E^at ^^^ extremely practical. Lenin and Trotsky have used these qualities 
things for their own ends ; they could not succeed unless their new teach- 

ings were supported by very practical aims. Dividing the land was 
taken as a symbol of fraternity, but it also meant the gift of land. 
It was the sole proof that an era of good will had set in. Public debt, 
national honor, foreign relations — such terms are mere unintel- 
ligible words to most of the ignorant peasants. In their thought the 
world is divided between Russians and foreigners. 

The American citizen speaks pretty directly through his congress- 
man. The Russian citizen proceeds through his soviet to provincial 
and regional congresses, which in turn lead up to the All-Russian 



II 



industrial 
regime 



The Political Geography of Russia 389 

Congress of 1500 members, a central committee of 250, and thence 
through 17 commissars to the leaders, such as Lenin and Trotsky. 
So tortuous a channel of approach to authority would try the spirit 
of an educated people ; to the Russian masses it presents impossible 
conditions of political navigation. 

MILITARY OPERATIONS SINCE 1917 

Thrown into a state of general disorder, Russia found herself in Russia's 
1919-1920 involved in not a single war, but a threefold war : war^ ° 

(1) A war between the Bolshevists and the non Bolshevist ele- 

ments 
(a) Within former Russia 

The Bolshevists have fought Denikin (southeastern Rus- 
sia and eastern Ukraine) ; Petlura (western Ukraine) ; the 
Poles; the Lithuanians; the Letts; the Esths; the army 
of Yudenitch ; the Finns ; Kolchak (Siberia) ; Wrangel 
(Crimea) ; etc. 

(6) External conflicts 

The Bolshevists have fought Allied armies on Russian 
soil in the Archangel region ; in Siberia (Czechs, Ameri- 
cans, and Japanese) ; in southern Russia (Rumanians and 
French). 

(2) A war between city and country 

The country is food-sufficient; the city is not. The city 
must supply the country with manufactured goods in 
exchange for food, and these materials of commerce the 
city could not get and deliver. With its function gone, it 
starved. 

(3) A war against banditry 

The returning soldiers took arms home with them. Many 
of them lived in organized bands that increased in num- 
bers and looted, burned, and devastated wherever they 
could. It will take a long time to get rid of them. 

Without any cohesion among the forces fighting the Bolshevist Fight 
forces, there was a general circle of opposing armies that grew to large Bolshevism 
size by the middle of the summer of 1919. It was felt by nearly all 
the Allied powers that the extremely bad economic condition of Russia 
would soon bring about a collapse of Bolshevist rule, provided that 
outside military pressure was maintained. France was especially 
eager to achieve this result because of the declared opposition of the 
Soviet government to any plan of payment of the pre-war debt, held 



390 The New World 

chiefly by French bankers. Nothing stifl'ened general Allied resistance 
so much as that part of the Bolshevist program which demanded the 
overthrow of the existing social and economic systems everywhere in 
the world. 
Bolshevist Hoping to bring the Bolshevists to terms, oblige them to renounce 
blockaded their program of world conquest, and make a peace fair to their 
neighbors as well as to Russia, the AUies, in August 1919, sought to 
establish a semi-blockade, the principal features of which were as 
follows : 

(1) No clearance papers were to be issued from or to Bolshevist 
Russia ; there was to be a land embargo of a similar nature ; 
and no passports were to be given to travelers to or from 
Russia. 

(2) No banking business was to be transacted with Russia; and 
as far as possible aU telegraphic and mail communications 
were to be stopped. 

Finding that this policy did not bring peace, the Allies, in the early 
months of 1920, adopted the principle of trade but not political recog- 
nition. Nothing practical came of this policy because the Soviet 
government insisted on combining trade agreements and political 
recognition. In the summer of 1920, after a rapid invasion of Russia 
as far as Kiev, the Polish armies were driven back and Poland itself 
was invaded by the Bolshevist armies. The terms which the Russian 
leaders sought to impose on Poland were so severe as practically to 
extinguish Poland, and the Allies supported the Poles with suppHes 
and military leadership. 

In the ensuing struggle the Russian Soviet forces were thrown back 
far east of the border of ethnographic Poland (Fig. 167). The Soviet 
government thereupon agreed to peace negotiations at Riga, in Latvia, 
with the result that a truce and preliminary peace were signed between 
Poland and Russia early in October 1920 (page 335). By midsum- 
mer of 1920 military opposition to the Bolshevists developed in the 
Crimea, where General Wrangel, with French recognition and assis- 
tance, had reorganized the remnants of Denikin's army. It was 
partly owing to Wrangel's success that the Soviet government hurried 
its peace parleys with Poland and agreed to acceptable terms. A 
promising aspect of Wrangel's work was his agreement of 13 April 
1920 with the Cossacks of the Don, which provided for their complete 
independence in domestic affairs and at least some measure of power 
in foreign relations that affect Cossack territories or people. With the 



Tlie Political Geography of Russia 391 

Poles eliminated, the Soviet army was concentrated on Wrangel, and 
in November 1920 all his forces were either driven out of the Crimea 
or captured. 

If the AUied and Associated Powers have repeatedly changed their 
policy toward Bolshevist Russia, it is also true that the Bolshevists 
likewise have changed their policies and views from time to time. 
Their present tendency appears to be toward a more moderate plan 
of government, though this change is interpreted by some students 
to mean only a respite in the war by which they expect ultimately 
to overwhelm the world. The dire calamities which Bolshevism 
has brought to Russia spring from deep-seated causes. It is im- 
portant to understand these to see how artificial the system would 
be if transplanted to countries with an economic and socigJ Ufe 
wholly different from that of Russia. 

ECONOMIC SITUATION 

In spite of government neglect and the natural rigors of the coun- Low state 
try, the population of Russia is rapidly increasing. As in the case ^ai^de-" 
of Austria-Hungary, a pohtical contest could have been avoided only veiopment 
by thorough reforms and the application of modern engineering skill. 
The reforms and the skill Russia's autocratic government could not 
supply, and one of the most serious questions confronting the coun- 
try today is whether her government, with its tendency toward 
conununism and the leveUng of classes — and particularly the level- 
ing of advantages — can amehorate the conditions that formed the 
basis of the pohtical troubles of the past. 

Russia has always been in a low state of industrial development. 
Household industries, in response to the long and otherwise idle winter, 
are stiU maintained on a large scale (Figs. 196, 197), and trade by 
barter is on a greater scale than in any other civihzed country of the 
world. Trade is stiU centered in part in village and city fairs of great 
commercial importance. More than 16,000 of these fairs are held in 
Russia, 85 per cent of them in European Russia. They are trading 
centers for the sale and in part for the exchange of goods, and like 
those that have been maintained in Latin America ever since the 
colonial period, they have retained not a httle of the medieval aspect 
of the fair. 

In normal times more than 100,000 visitors attend the Nijni Nov- 
gorod fair from 28 July to 7 September. The principal products 
dealt in are tea, raw cotton, furs, hides, woolen goods, undressed fur, 
camel's hair, iron and other metals. 



392 



The New World 




Imported 
raw ma- 
terials 



Disad- 
vantages 
of the 
navigable 
streams 



Fig. 195. View of Nijni Novgorod and the fair across the Oka River. 

In the factories of the large cities, wages have hitherto been low, 
while the cost of production has been high on account of the nu- 
merous church hoUdays and the tendency of the Russian industrial 
worker to return to the land for the harvest season. A considerable 
quantity of the raw material for manufacture was imported, the rate 
of transportation was high, the industrial centers were far from the 
sea, capital and the higher grades of skilled labor had to come from 
abroad. 

In the absence of first-class roads and with few railroads until recent 
years, the streams and canals were the basis of transportation in large 
districts for a considerable part of the year. They have, however, 
only hmited advantages. The great change in rainfall from summer 
to winter renders the streams unnavigable for part of the year, and 



The Political Geography of Russia 



393 



: OPTtirzAjir, 

Pe!i=ogr^d.- X 




i More Than 1000 families 



^From 500 to 1000 



X From 50 to 500 



Fig. 196. Peasant industries: metals and minerals (upper panel). The rise of large in- 
dustries in Russia is a recent and limited development. The long winters of the central 
and northern portions and the poor roads have impelled the peasants to engage in industry 
locally and on a household scale. Compare with Figures 198 and 199. 

Fig. 197. Peasant industries: textiles (lower panel). Wood, leather, and other peasant 
industries show about the same distributions and form an interesting contrast in position 
and character with the mining and metal industries on a great scale that have developed in 
southern Russia, notably in the Donetz basin near the Black Sea. 

all of them are frozen for a part of the year, — the Volga for nearly 
half the year in the north and for three months at Astrakhan on the 
Caspian Sea ; the Don for more than 100 days on the average ; the 
Dnieper for the same period; the Dvina for about 125 days; and 
the Vistula at Warsaw for more than two months. 

Russia is still poorly served by railroads, and what is almost equally 
bad, her roUing stock (especially her locomotives) has been all but 
used up, first in the World War, and later in the civil war of the 



394 



The New World 



Present 
state of 
transpor- 
tation 



Old land- 
owners 
driven 
from 
Russia 



Seizure 
of lands in 
other parts 
of Europe 



Bolshevists. According to official figures of the Soviet government, 
nearly half the capacity of the freight trains is filled with coal or wood 
or oil for the locomotives themselves, a quarter is filled with war 
materials, and a tenth with confiscated goods, leaving only a small 
percentage for trade. More than half the locomotives are defective ; 
all railways are operated with a huge deficit. River transportation 
has been greatly reduced. As coal production has dropped nearly one 
half, the government permits forest cutting along both railways and 
navigable rivers. Only grain production has increased, but the crop 
cannot be utilized on account of the wretched transport conditions. 

Having much food to distribute and coarse bulky products, such 
as hay and lumber, Russia needs to develop her railways and canals. 
A normal deficiency of food occurs over three fom-ths of European 
Russia and must be made good by imports from southern Russia or 
from outside countries (Fig. 200). 

PRESENT PHASES OF THE QUESTION OF LAND TENURE 

In the old regime the land-owning nobihty held the mass of the 
people in subjection, controlled the army and the courts, and kept 
tight hold on the local government. The. revolution swept away this 
long-established type of feudalism and drove the aristocracy not only 
from their estates but also from Russia. The estates were divided up. 

The seizure of the landed estates of the nobility was part of a gen- 
eral European movement, for the same thing happened in Hungary, 
Poland, Czecho-Slovakia, Italy, and Rumania. In these countries 
laws were passed compelling the owners to sell all but a moderate 
share of their lands. In Poland the peasants could secure their object 
only by joining the SociaUsts of the towns, but this alliance will not 
last long, for, in every respect except their attitude toward the land- 
owners, the radicals of the towns are the exact opposite of the conserva- 
tive peasant class. In Italy, on the other hand, there were violent 
disorders in October and November of 1919, as a result of the peasants' 
forcible seizure of the land. In Germany the big landowners have 
until 1921 in which to sell their estates. The process of division of 
large estates is going on in the Ukraine also, in the Baltic Provinces, 
and in Rumania. A great landholding nobility, long politically pow- 
erful, has lost its monopoly of the soil of eastern and central Europe. 
Thus both the democratic and the nationalist movements of central 
and eastern Europe have had a strong socialistic background. 

In the peasant class we may find the steadiest force of the future 
commonwealths of Russia, Hungary, Poland, and Czecho-Slovakia. 



1 



The Political Geography of Russia 



395 



Once they have the land that they have long desired, once they own peasant 
property and require laws to protect it, once they have their own gleadymg 
products to market, the peasants will desire a steady government ^°'<=e 
and individual ownership of property instead of the communism of 
the Bolshevists. 

THE SEPARATION OF THE BORDER PEOPLES 

When Russia became Bolshevist the border peoples everywhere „ 

^ ^ -^ Nature of 

broke away from the central government, organized local govern- the border 
ments, and sought to win recognition as independent sovereign states. ^*^*^^ 
The people of each region had long felt that their provincial problems 
were neglected by the former central government, and, infected by 
the general unrest and disorder of the World War, they sought a change 
of authority. The Bolshevist leaders were willing to sign with Ger- 
many the treaty of Brest-Litovsk in 1918, which withdrew Russian 
sovereignty from the Baltic Provinces, thus recognizing the measurably 
non-Russian character of the Esths and Letts as well as of the Finns, 
Lithuanians, and Poles. That treaty was denounced by Germany 
in the armistice of 11 November 1918, but the action of the Bolshevist 
government is significant in the history of later attempts of these 
border peoples to lead an independent national life. Of equal signifi- 
cance is the recognition by the Soviet government in May 1920 of 
the "Far-Eastern Democratic RepubHc" of Siberia, and its expressed 
desire to conclude commercial and political agreements. 

The following table gives the area, population, and degree of ethnic 
purity of the groups (exclusive of Finland and Poland) that have 
broken away from Russia in Europe and Transcaucasia : 



Esthonia 

Latvia 

Lithuania^ 

Ukraine^ 

Kuban 

North Caucasia 

Azerbaijan 

Georgia 

Armenia (Russian Armenia only) 



Area in Sq. Mi. 



20,000 
25,000 
20,000 
200,000 
33,000 
58,000 
40,000 
35,000 
25,000 



Population 



1,750,000 
2,400,000 
2,500,000 
30,000,000 
3,500,000 
4,300,000 
4,000,000 
2,000,000 
1,500,000 



Ethnic 

PUKITT 



93 
70 
66 
70 



75 
75 
50 



Russia may become stronger pofitically for the loss of her subject 

^ Figures for Lithuania exclude the Vilna area and adjacent country in dispute with 
Poland. 

^ Attempted separation repeatedly. 



396 



The New World 



7 /'""^--^ r ^'M T 
/ POPULATION DENSITY 

per sq km 
Under 10 

10 - 25 kX^x^xv^^ 25 - G4 

25-50 f^m ^ G4 - 128 

50 - 75 ^g 128 - 192 

75 - 100 ^^^ 192- 25G 

Over 100 ■■■ Over Z5£ JS-; 




Fig. 198. The distribution of population densities in European Russia as in 1910 according to 
Petermanns Mitteihmgen, 191.3, I, PI. 2, and Romer, Atlas geographique et statistique de la Pologne, 
1916. Note the effect of withdrawing Poland, the Baltic Provinces, Finland, the Ukraine, and 
Transcaucasia. The boundaries of the different governments of pre-war Russia are shown by fine 
dotted lines ; the capitals are given in each case, without parentheses if the population exceeds 
100,000, with parentheses if under 100,000. 

races, the Poles, the Finns, the Georgians, the Letts, the Esths, and 
the Lithuanians ; the struggle of these peoples for freedom threatened 
the unity and institutions of the Russian state. The freedom-seeking 
peoples within the borders of the former Russian Empire were more 
democratic than their rulers, the Russian nobility. When they became 
free they discarded the rule of a medieval caste for the ballot of a 



The Political Geography of Russia 397 

modern state, but their political strength and their ability to create 
favorable economic conditions remain to be proved. 

Working against the union of the fragments of former Russia is physical 
the nature of the land itself. In Siberia, for instance, broad oJ^t^e *^ 
mountains and plateaus (the Yablanoi and Stanavoi ranges) cross Russian 
the region in the neighborhood of Lake Irkutsk and separate °^^"^^ 
the lower Amur provinces from western Siberia; the trans- 
Siberian railroad cuts across them, but one railroad is too slender 
a thread to unite governments and people so widely different in op- 
portunity and in contact with the outside world. The chief rivers 
of Siberia flow northward to an ice-choked sea, accessible only from 
the west. Working towards separation is the desire of each section to 
profit by the special resources in its possession. Thus the Republic of 
Georgia produces 44 per cent of the world's manganese and wishes to 
profit by it, and a similar motive animates the Azerbaijan Tatars, 
who produce 13 per cent of the world's oil in the Baku region and 
do not wish to share the benefits with the rest of Russia. 

If union can be effected at aU, it will be only by forming the scat- 
tered parts into a loose confederation that will guarantee that the 
needs of the local groups, or county govermnents, shall be met, 
while protecting the larger interests to which every state is com- 
mitted, especially in regard to foreign trade. 

The growth of cooperative societies in Russia is an extraordinary 
expression of the community spirit for a country in which more than 
80 per cent of the population are illiterate. In the last forty years 
the number of societies has increased from less than 400 to nearly 
50,000, with a total enrolhnent of 20,000,000 heads of families. But 
for these societies the economic needs of the Russian people could not 
have been met at all. Their work is based upon the principle of ex- 
change of raw materials for manufactured goods. They take the 
place, to a large degree, of the middleman class of other countries. 
Given peace and a restoration of foreign trade, Russia may quickly 
gain a place as a great trading nation through the development of her 
large cooperative unions. 

The Transcaucasian peoples have broken away from the main mass xranscau- 
of Russians and possess nominal independence (pp. 450-461). Theo- '^^^^^^^^ 
retically, Georgia and Armenia are republics. The high snowy wall of 
the Caucasus separates them from the wheat-growing Cossacks of the 
Kuban, southeast of the Sea of Azov. The Caspian and Black seas are 
their natural frontiers east and west. In the valley lowland between 
the Caucasus and the Armenian plateau we have a thoroughfare for 



398 



The New World 



Possibility 
of a Black 
Sea Con- 
federation 



Russian 
extension 
into Asia 
a thing of 
the past 



Economic 
conse- 
quences 
of Ukrainian 
separation 



commerce for trans-Caspian or Russian Turkestan, an outlet for the 
manganese of Georgia and the rich oil fields of Baku. Inhabited by 
small nations the region would not be an outpost of Russian imperial 
designs on the Persian Gulf or on Alexandretta in the Mediterranean, 
where Anatolia and Syria meet. 

Even if the whole of former Russia should not unite into a com- 
mon empire, there is a real possibility of a Black Sea federation, be- 
cause of the common interests of the Ukraine, the Don, and the Kuban. 
The three wish to have : 

(1) Access to Black Sea ports. 

(2) Free use of the Dardanelles. 

(3) Strong defense against disorder. 

(4) Technical help and loans from foreign powers. 

(5) Free inter-regional trade. 

The Kuban produces rice, wheat, wool, tobacco, and copper; the 
Ukraine sends to the Don and the Kuban corn, sugar, flour, and iron 
and steel products. Free interstate conunerce is a real necessity, 
whatever political ties may be developed. 

A Siberian and a Turkestan confederation are other possibiHties, 
but of them nothing definite can be said at this time. 

The future international problems of Russia cannot be forecast 
clearly, but if the government becomes in truth democratic, the long 
struggle with England in central Asia will probably not be revived. 
In Mongolia and Tibet, in Persia and Afghanistan, in Caucasia and 
at Constantinople, the Russian has been pressing forward for three 
hundred years, and no system of government can stand that denies 
him proper commercial outlets. His slogan has been "a warm-water 
port." That explains his reaching out in the Far East to Vladivostok, 
which proved not to be ice-free in winter; it explains his effort to 
reach the head of the Persian Gulf, where he was blocked by the 
British ; it explains the development of the Murman coast, where a 
branch of the northern Atlantic warm-water drift keeps Alexandrovsk, 
north of the Arctic Circle, open even in winter ; it explains the strug- 
gle with Turkey and the west-European powers for Constantinople. 

The advantage of reorganizing the Russian realm on the lines of a 
great confederation instead of allowing it to break up indefinitely 
is most clearly seen when we consider the economic and geographical 
effects of withdrawing the southern region — a possibility involved in 
the Ukrainian movement. As originally delimited in 191 8, the Repubfic 
of the Ukraine would have an area of 20,000 square miles and a popula- 
tion, chiefly Ukrainian, of about 30,000,000 (page 224), out of a total of 



A 



The Political Geography of Russia 



399 




Fig. 199. Wheat and rye, cultivated and arable lands of European Russia. Compare with 
Figure 191. Poland, Finland, the Caucasus region, and western Siberia are omitted. From 
maps in La Russie a la fin du 19" siicle, Paris, 1900. 

100,000,000 for all European Russia (Fig. 180). This means that the 
Ukraine includes 15 per cent of the area of European Russia and 30 
per cent of the population. Its population density is 150 to the 
square mile, as compared with 70 per cent for European Russia. 

In European Russia about 25 per cent of the land is arable and 40 
per cent is woodland ; but in the Ukraine the arable land constitutes 
65 per cent and the woodland 10 per cent of the total area (forests^ 
3 per cent). The Ukraine is the garden of Russia, a pleasant, warm 



400 



The New World 




Fig. 200. The chief cereal supply of European Russia. A belt having neither marked excess 
nor deficiency trends northeastward from northern Rumania to the Urals and separates a huge 
northwestern cereal-deficient tract dependent upon the southern Ukraine, the Don region, and 
the Taurida northwest of the Caucasus. The map suggests one of the grave problems of the 
rest of Russia should the Ukraine become independent. The figures give the average annual 
per capita production for each government. The average annual consumption of the four 
grains mapped is about SOO pounds a person. 



southland quite unlike the northern half of the country. It pro- 
duces 40 per cent of the wheat of the whole empire, 50 per cent of the 
barley, and more than 80 per cent of the sugar. In addition it produces 
two thirds of the tobacco of European Russia. Its grain crop in 1919. 
in spite of disturbed conditions, was one third larger than in peace times, 



The Political Geography of Russia 



401 




Fig. 201. Part of the harbor of Odessa, the chief Russian port on the Black Sea. 



The Ukraine also has very valuable deposits of coal and iron ore. 
Nearly 70 per cent of Ukrainian coal comes from the Donetz basin, 
which is located partly in Ekaterinoslav and partly in the Don terri- 
tory. These two regions together (Donetz and Don) yield 90 per cent 
of the total coal production in European Russia, exclusive of Poland. 
The Ukraine exports coal to Austria by way of the Danube and to 
Turkey by way of the Black Sea ports. Of its exports 83 per cent 
(by weight) pass through Black Sea ports. About three fourths of 
the iron ore produced in Russia comes from the Ukraine, chiefly 
about Ekaterinoslav and the province of Kherson. 

Though the Ukraine comprises about 10 per cent of the former terri- 
tory of European Russia, it has 25 per cent of the railway mileage. 

These figures for crops, coal and iron production, export, and railway interde- 
mileage, show in a striking way the dependence of the central and ^^ ^^g'^'^^ 
northern parts of Russia upon the Ukraine for food, fuel, and access Ukraine and 
to the sea. The Ukraine is dependent, but not to an equal degree, Russfa 
upon the rest of Russia. It needs the oil of Baku, the timber of the 
northern forests, the dairy products of Siberia, the cotton of Trans- 
caucasia and Turkestan. Russia would be a far stronger country if it 
held together instead of breaking up into fragments. While its eco- 
nomic conditions make the Ukraine a fairly self-dependent unit empha- 



402 



The New World 



sized by its geographical situation and character, it has never had 
pohtical unity, and its people do not form a distinct and homogeneous 
nation. There is no distinctive social and cultural type. These facts 
were clearly seen when the Ukrainian government began to function 
after the fall of the first democratic government under Kerensky in 
1917. Division and conflict began at once to sap the national strength. 
A western Ukrainian Republic under Petlura was organized and op- 
posed Poles in the west, Bolshevists in the northeast, and the central 
Ukrainian government on the southeast. Later the central Ukrainian 
government disappeared and Petlura joined the Poles against the 
Bolshevists. In case of the complete defeat of Soviet authority, the 
policy of the Poles and the French would probably be to favor the 
creation of a separate Ukrainian state and thus reduce the strength 
and the chances of future Russian aggression. 



Tribal 
organiza- 
tion of the 
people 



Their 
enmity 
toward 
the Turks 



THE COUNTRY OF THE DON COSSACKS 

Still another group that favored a separatist movement and that 
is of great geographical and political interest is formed by the Don 
Cossacks, who hve in southeastern Russia in a province divided by 
the Don River. The country is in general level. It is the transition 
region in climate and products between Asia and Europe. The soil 
east of the Don River is more suitable for grazing than for farming. 
The soil west of the Don is a deep, black, rich loam. The river itself 
is not navigable except for small craft. There are important deposits 
of coal, iron, and salt. 

The people are of Tatar origin and originally Uved by fishing, hunt- 
ing, and plundering. It is only recently that they have become stock 
raisers and farmers. They own a higher percentage of live stock 
than any other group in the former Russian Empire. There are also 
20,000 fishermen on the Sea of Azov and the lower Don. 

Wherever the soil was tilled, the labor was done by serfs. The 
Cossacks themselves disdained agriculture. They had a loose tribal 
organization which involved an assembly that determined questions 
of war and peace, and elected officers, including a headman, or het- 
man. 

In the 17th and 18th centuries the relations between the Cossacks 
and the Russians, which had been marked by mutual ill wiH, became 
closer because of their common interest in fighting the Turk on the 
northern coast of the Black Sea and in the Caucasus. There is an 
eirmy of about 25,000 Cossacks in the Don Province in peace times, 
but five or six times this number may be called out. They are all 



li 



The Political Geography of Russia 403 

good horsemen and fight admirably in the old-fashioned way, but 
not against modern artillery and in prolonged campaigns. 

The total population of the country of the Don Cossacks is about Denikin's 
4,000,000, of which 67 per cent are Great Russian and 28 per cent "o'^s^ack 
Ukrainian. During the civil war of the Bolshevist regime they soldiers 
have formed an independent unit, fighting first under the leadership 
of Kolchak, then of Denikin, and later cooperating with Wrangel. 
Their local successes were due to the nature of the fighting, which 
was carried on in flat, open country where horsemen have an advan- 
tage over foot soldiers. 

THE SIBERIAN REALM 

An important feature of the character of the Russian people is Russian 
their ready adaptation to new conditions. This quality has exhibited adaptation 
itself throughout Russian history. Successive waves of population 
swept across European Russia in the 7th, 8th, and 9th centuries of 
our era, and one may say that the entire population consisted of 
pioneers experimenting under new conditions. There went on during 
this period a process of ethnic absorption and modification, until 
there was evolved the Slav type of the present day, fairly uni- 
form in racial quality in later times. The Russian has always been 
able to become farmer, tradesman, hunter, fisherman, or cattle breeder, 
without losing the community organization that more than any other 
thing characterizes his life. This adaptability to circumstances has 
made him a successful explorer and colonist and has been one of the 
most powerful agencies of empire. 

In recent years the Russian colonizing movement has been most 
effective in Siberia. A narrow belt of European population has 
been thrown right across Siberia for 4000 miles from Omsk to Vladi- 
vostok (Fig. 203). With its 13,000,000 people, the region is so im- 
portant to the future of Russia that its historical development as well 
as its economic and political problems deserve special consideration. 

Up to the 16th century, Siberia was not safe for the settler or the Early 
traveler. Trade across it was from point to point through tribal comiuests 
territory, and continued thus until the subjugation of the southern in Siberia 
region, first by the Turks and then by the Russians. By the early 
17th century, after repeated efforts and failures by others, Yermak, 
a Russian Cossack explorer, had opened wide the door to the Orient 
and made possible the acquisition by Russia in later years of the vast 
Siberian realm, that includes a fourth of all Asia. For Russia the 
work of Yermak marks the beginning of a new epoch. By 1630 the 



404 



The Neio World 



Poor fa- 
cilities for 
export of 
products 



Russians claimed to be masters of the Yenisei. In 1638 tea was first 
imported from China. By 1643 the Cossacks had reached Lake 
Baikal, and by 1656 they had reached the Bering Sea, every step ac- 
companied by hardship. There followed a fierce contest with the 
Manchm^ians for the possession of the Amm* country, which ended 
in 1688 with Russian colonists firmly planted on China's northern 
frontier. 

In 1658 Russia seized the Amur, and by the treaty of Aigun the 
Amur was made the boundary between the Russian and Chinese 
empires. In 1733 came the expedition of Bering and Chirikov, who 
discovered the mainland of North America, the Aleutian Islands, and 
the Kuriles north of Japan. There followed great activity in trade 
and trapping. Just before 1800 the Russian- American Company 
was organized, with enormous privileges. 

With the Russians firmly planted in eastern Siberia, the power of 
the Mongol-Tatar hordes was forever broken. If western civiliza- 
tion held back the Slavic hordes, the latter in turn defended western 
Europe from further Mongol invasion. To Russia, the advance into 
Siberia was the opening of an epoch as important for her as the dis- 
covery of America and the opening of the water route to India were 
to the western powers. 

Colonists and criminals were sent into Siberia to estabhsh settle- 
ments around the fortresses, to work in the mines, and to guEo-d the 
fur-trade routes. In the 16th and 17th centuries these movements 
of colonists and prisoners or exiles became an established custom. 
The first Siberian prisoners were sent out in 1593, and at about the 
same time state aid was given to a first group of farmer colonists. 

The census of 1897 gave Siberia 300,000 prisoners out of a total pop- 
ulation of 5,700,000. Of the present total of 13,000,000 population, 
9,000,000 are Russians. In the past twenty-five years the popula- 
tion of Siberia has doubled. In the early 19th century, Russian 
state settlers began to go into the region in large mmibers, and they 
are increasing faster than the total by about one fifth. The 6000- 
mile trans-Siberian railway was pushed to completion in 1904, not 
only for the purpose of defense but also in order to get colonists into 
Siberia. 

Figure 203 shows the distribution of Russian settlements in Siberia 
and their close connection with the trans-Siberian railroad and its 
branches. However, in spite of the railroad, the conditions of trans- 
portation are still exceedingly difficult. The freight rates are high, 
and the markets of the Far East and of Europe, which furnish the only 



The Political Geography of Russia 



405 




Fig. 202. Russian colonists emigrating to Siberia. 

outlet for the grain, dairy products, etc., of Siberia, are far distant. 
As a result the development of the country is still slow, in spite of the 
fact that the quantity of grain produced is almost double the amount 
consumed. 

Grain and dairy products are produced in huge quantities in the Arctic 
pastures and prairies of the northern section, just at the edge of the Siberia* 
great taiga, or forest belt ; cotton is the chief commercial crop of the 
southern section in Turkestan, where irrigation is developing to give 
life to the desert country beyond the Caspian. Just before the 
World War, great trading companies had started a regular fleet of 
nearly eighty steamers on the Siberian rivers and had brought out 
butter, furs, lumber, etc., in huge quantities ; they had demonstrated 
the possibilities of the Arctic route to Siberia, a thing that Nansen, 
the Arctic explorer, had long advocated. 

With the revolution of 1917 in Russia, Siberia broke up into groups. Political 
Soviet committees were formed in all the important centers and o^sibe^ria 
included all classes, even bankers and business men. At first the 
system worked well, because it was democratic and there was no 
violence; but soon opposition " Soviets" appeared. Democratic re- 
publics were organized in many places. With the coming into power 
of the Bolshevists, eastern Siberia fell into disorder, until the military 



406 



The New World 



Objects of 
revolu- 
tionary 
groups in 
Siberia 



expedition of the Allies into eastern Siberia quieted the region and 
Admiral Kolchak on the west gained control of the border. With the 
defeat of Kolchak late in 1919 disorder again became general, and 
no coherent authority is now exercised. 

A repubhc of Eastern Siberia has been organized, but its power will 
be feeble so long as it has no effective railway connection with 
Europe and so long as Japan holds Vladivostok, the eastern com- 
mercial outlet of Siberia. 

In European Russia the land question had been one of the bases of 
revolutionary agitation for many years, and with the passing of the 
old regime, the reform of the land tenure system became a part of the 
Soviet program. In contrast with this situation is the absence of a 
land question in Siberia. Hence the Soviet government was able 
to organize in Siberia local governments sympathetic towards it, not 
for the usual reasons, but for the reason that Siberia is composed of 
frontier peoples who had always striven for local self-government of the 
zemstvo type, as promised by the CzEir in 1905. 

This promise has now been repeated by the Soviet government, 
but there is no substance to the promise, since there is no unity among 
the Siberian people as to the practical form that local self-government 
shall take, and there is likewise as yet no uniformity or stability in the 




Fig. 203. The field of settlement of Russian colonists in Siberia according to the Atlas of Asiatic 
Russia, 1914. Note the scattered settlements in dry Turkestan and the continuity of settle- 
ments in the belt of heavier rainfall on the margin of forest and grassland farther north (Fig. 204). 



The Political Geography of Russia 



407 




408 



Tlie New World 




Fig. 205. Samoyeds of the island of Nova Zembla, a Russian possession in the Arctic. Russia's 
northern country for the most part is inhabited by primitive peoples of which this is one type. 



Great size 
of Siberia 
and great 
extent of 
its frontier 



Soviet government itself. Siberia is without leaders. Its people are 
interested in the discussion of theories of government, but only a few 
are sufficiently educated to work out practical measures, and there 
is also a large proportion of lawless people who make the organization 
of life and government still more difficult. 

Siberia is a country difficult to control at best. Its area is 4,832,000 
square miles, excluding the Transcaspian, Turkestan, and steppe 
provinces, or 6,294,000 square miles if we include these provinces. 
Thus in size it is far greater than the United States, and it is more 
difficult of access than northern Canada. The length of the Russian- 
Chinese boundary is 4700 miles ; the northern coast hue from Kara 
Bay to Bering Strait is about 10,000 miles long ; the length of the 
eastern coast line on the Pacific is nearly 8400 miles. To guard the 
excessively long and remote frontiers, partly in the north, partly in 
the mountains, is a problem of first importance, and but for the fact 
that long stretches of the frontier are yet uninhabited, effective 
government control could not be exercised. 



CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR 

CONSTANTINOPLE AND ITS THOROUGHFARE 

There are four cities, it is said, that belong to all men rather than Constanti- 
to the people of one nation — Rome, Athens, Jerusalem, and Con- of°four"*^ 
stantinople. All four are closely related to Mediterranean history, world cities 
The capture of each one of them at one tune or another has been a 
turning point in human affairs. Their temples have seen the growth 
of powerful religious influences. Their streets have echoed more than 
once to the tramp of armies bent on conquest far beyond "the rim of 
the known world." 

Constantinople is one of the most beautiful cities in the world and has Historic 
a history full of color and tragedy and romantic adventure. Jason th"dfy° 
sailed past the site of it in his search for the Golden Fleece. From 
the days of Xerxes and of Alexander the Great down to its capture in 
1453 by the Turks, it was a point of great mihtary interest. For 
nearly a thousand years it was one of the chief centers of culture and 
the capital of the Byzantine, or Eastern, Empire. Its natural defenses 
are very strong. Napoleon believed that its possession was worth half 
an empire. Even under the handicaps of Turkish rule Constantinople 
remained a great port. Its position at the crossroads of Europe and 
Asia enabled it, down to recent times, to profit enormously from the 
trade of southern Russia, the Transcaucasus, Persia, and Mesopotamia, 
and also, in earUer years, from the overland trade of Inner Asia, India, 
and the Far East. Through it ran a part of the Berlin-Bagdad rail- 
way line, by which Germany expected to control the Near East and 
the road to India. 

As a commercial thoroughfare for eastern products, the Constanti- Oniy a 
nople region has now only a limited value. A large part of the com- o™the^rade 
merce of the Straits — that is, both the Dardanelles and the Bos- °* *® ^°^' 

poms sent 

porus (Fig. 207) — passes the door of the city but does not enter it. through 
While its historical position as a focus of sea and land roads is still nopie*^°^' 
maintained, the development of ocean commerce in modern times 
and the possibihties, suppUed by the Suez Canal (opened in 1869), 
of an aU-sea road from Persia and India to western Europe, have 
greatly diminished its importance in this respect. It has profited 
little from the rapid development of Black Sea lands during the past 
hundred and fifty years. Southwestern Russia, in that period, was 
transformed from a pastoral to an agricultural realm, rich in cereals. 
Cities grew marvelously ; industries sprang up ; oil and manganese 

409 



410 



The New World 




Fig. 206. General view 



Russian 
desire for 
Constanti- 
nople 



were exported in large quantities. From 70 to 90 per cent of the total 
exports of these products went by way of the Straits. 

But in just the proportion that these lands became economically 
strong, Constantinople — the gateway of southern Russia — gained 
in pohtical and military importance. For centuries it was one of the 
settled aims of intelligent Russians, as well as of Russian rulers, to 
gain possession of the city ; and religious motives were added to 
commercial reasons : Constantinople was the city from which Russia 
got her religion. 

The pressure of the Russians was first exerted against the Greeks 
(for example, in the 10th century), and after 1453 against the Turks. 
In 1878 Russian soldiers were almost within sight of the minarets 
of Constantinople. In 1914 it was promised to Russia by the Allies if 
they should win the war. It is the only "warm" port and one of the 
three "open" ports that Russia could expect to have. The others 
are Vladivostok in eastern Siberia (Fig. 244) and Alexandrovsk on the 
Murman coast of the Arctic (Fig. 90).^ 



^ At Riga the period of ice blockade is reduced to onfe month by the use of ice-breakers. 
Vladivostok, though called an "open port," is closed for a short period in extreme winter 
weather; hence, in part, the struggle for Dairen (Port Dalny) during the Russo-Japanese 
War. 



Constantinople and Its Thoroughfare 



411 




Brown Bros. 



of Constantinople. 



CONSTANTINOPLE S PLACE IN THE PAN-GERMAN SCHEME 

It was during the period of rapid growth of Black Sea commerce Growth of 
from 1880 to 1914 that there was developed in Germany a poHcy which ^®J.™*? 
went under the name of Pan-Germanism and which was fostered by the and eco- 
military party and the Hohenzollerns. It sought to achieve many im- flu™ce° 
perial objects, among which was the control of the rich lands of the Near 
East as a source of raw material for the crowded industrial districts of 
Germany. In 1898 the German Emperor visited Damascus, Jerusalem, 
and Constantinople, making his visit the occasion for the furthering of 
Pan-German aims. From that time until the opening of the war in 
1914, Germany pressed the construction of the Berlin-Bagdad railway 
as part of a general scheme for reaching into subtropical lands and 
controlling a larger share of the world's raw materials. She aimed 
to build the Bagdad railway to the head of the Persian Gulf, whence 
she could divert the commerce of India and the Far East. The 
Bagdad railway and its branches were her means of reaching 
the copper of the Taurus Mountains in southwestern Armenia, 
and of bringing out the tobacco, fruits, cotton, and wool of Meso- 
potamia and Kurdistan in return for manufactured articles from 
German mills. 



412 



The New World 



German 
goods in 
competi- 
tion with 
those of 
England 
and France 



German enterprise was highly successful, and German imports 
into the Turkish Empire rose from 6 per cent in 1887 to 21 per cent 
in 1910; those of Austria from 13 per cent to 21 per cent. During 
the same time the imports of English goods fell from 60 per cent to 
35 per cent, and of French goods from 18 per cent to 11 per cent of the 
total. German business men from 1908 to 1911 obtained very im- 
portant concessions for the port of Alexandretta and for the building 
of a line from Bagdad to Basra, in territory of great strategic impor- 
tance to India and the Far East and in relation to the politics and com- 
merce of the Mohammedan world (Fig. 23). In 1913 General Liman 
von Sanders headed a German military mission at Constantinople 
which thereafter practically controlled the Ottoman army. 

The latest struggle for Constantinople began early in the World 
War. It led to the disastrous Gallipoli expedition of the Alhes against 
the Turks in 1915-1916 ; and after the defeat of this expedition 
and the entry of Bulgaria into the war, direct railway connection 
was established from Berlin to Constantinople, thence across Ana- 
tolia and via the tunnel through the Taurus Mountains to the head 
of the Gulf of Alexandretta, and again through the tunnel that pierces 
the Amanus range to Aleppo and eastward to Nisibin. Germany 
did not relinquish her hold of the Bagdad line until the end of the 
war. She furnished supplies and ammunition for the Turkish armies 
operating in Palestine, which armies the AUied forces (chiefly British) 
could dislodge only by building another line from El Kantara in 
Egypt northeastward through the Sinai desert to Gaza, and thence 
to a connection with Jerusalem. 



Free use 
of the 
Straits of 
interest to 
many 
powers 



ELEMENTS AFFECTING THE SETTLEMENT OF THE 
CONSTANTINOPLE QUESTION 

It was natural that the people of the other three world-cities, men- 
tioned on page 409, should be greatly concerned in the fate of Con- 
stantinople. Italy has a traditional friendship for Rumania, which 
she can reach directly only by passing Constantinople. The Jews of 
Palestine, and likewise the Syrians and Armenians, farther north, 
watched with intense interest the fate of Constantinople in the World 
War ; the capture of the city by the Allies, it was believed, would free 
all the oppressed peoples of the Turkish Empire. 

Greece has long hoped to restore to the protection of the home- 
land those Greeks who live in all the fair lands bordering the Black 
and Mediterranean seas (Fig. 158). She could never relinquish the 



Constantinople and Its Thoroughfare 



413 




. J= SE it! 

S 'o ^ CO 



414 



The New World 



Greek 
wish to 
have 

ownership 
of Con- 
stantinople 



Changes in 
the popu- 
lation of 
the city 



thought that her thousand years' possession of Constantinople had 
given her the strongest historical claim. Greeks form the largest 
element in the Christian population of the city. The war of Greek 
Independence (1821-1829) had for one of its objects the re-creation 
of a ]5yzantine Eni})ire, including Constant in(){)le. Rut the Greeks 
are not experienced governors of alien people. To be sure, in the 
colonial period Greece had settlements from one end of the Mediter- 
ranean to the other; and like most other peoples the Greeks wish 
to see their ancient glories restored. Of course that can not be done 
without ignoring the ancient glories of other equally worthy states 
whose claims overlap those of the Greeks.^ If the risk of war is ever 
to be seriously diminished, rival nations will have to give up the idea 
of a restoration of ancient glories by force of arms. 

Constantinople is a rich city to hold ; and it will grow rapidly with 
the development of its tributary regions. Its growth would be stinm- 
lated by the construction of a tunnel or bridge — or both — from 
one side of the Bosporus to the other. The Bosporus is only 2000 
feet across at the narrowest point, or less than half the distance 
spanned by the Brooklyn Bridge or the Eads Bridge at St. Louis. 

In addition to the 150,000 Greeks, there are 400,000 Turks in 
Constantinople, and less than 150,000 Armenians, besides 50,000 
Jews, as well as Kurds and other Asiatics. Greeks and Armenians 
are almost certain to increase their cily populations. Both ])e()ples 
are traders, and the Greeks are also famous sailors. Allied control 
of Constantinople and the Straits will favor Greek influence there 
and throughout the Near East, where within the next fifty years the 
Greeks have a chance of becoming a powerful people. 

Constantinople was the last stronghold in Europe of the Turks, 
who had taken it forty years before Columbus sailed for America. 
For four and a half centuries the Turk has been astride one of the 
world's chief thoroughfares of conunerce. The Mediterranean and 
its eastern approaches in the region of Constantinople have been 
called the moat between Christianity and Islam. It was a moat 
that had been crossed at but two places, Constantinople and Gibraltar 

(Fig. ^255). 

In modern times we have thought of Constantinople as a Turkish 
city ; but, as we have seen, it was the capital of the Eastern Chris- 
tian Church for more than a thousand years, before the Turk came. 
There is no absolutely vital connection between the Mohammedan 
religion and Constantinople. On the other hand, the head of the 
Greek Church, called the Patriarch, lives there and signs himself 



Constantinople and lis Thoroughfare 415 

Archbishop of Constantinople. To be sure, the Sultan declared him- 
self to be the supreme head of the Mohammedan religion, but this 
assertion was not agreed to by all the Mohannnedans themselves. 
Mecca has always been their religious capital. In actual practice the 
Sultan delegated his religious power to the Sheikh-Ul-Islam, and 
every Moslem law or decision was supposed to be confirmed by him ; 
but the Arab chiefs of Mecca, Medina, Bagdad, Smyrna, Yemen, and 
Asir never acknowledged this ruling. 

It was jealousy among the great powers that kept the Turk so Conflict of 
long in Constantinople. No power wanted to see another in con- pJench""** 
trol of the strategic gateway of the Bosporus. This jealousy is in poHcy in 
large part the basis of the present settlement. In many respects Ea^st ^""^ 
the policies of France and Great Britain are directly opposed to each 
other here, as well as elsewhere in the Near East. For example, the 
British would Hke to see the Greeks stay in Smyrna, because it would 
])ut not only the Smyrna region but its Turkish hinterland under the 
influence of the British fleet and British commercial interests. On 
the other hand, the French would like to see the Greeks driven out of 
Smyrna, where they would greatly foster British trade and become 
rivals of French trade. 

In Constantinople we are likely to see this rivalry become acute. Acute con- 
For the French have been active, ever since the Turkish armistice, stantilo^^e 
at Constantinople and in the Balkans, where the Allied army was for 
a long time under the command of a l^Vench general. This general 
has assumed, and all his oflicers with him, that Greece, Rumania, 
Serbia, and Turkey are a French sphere of influence, a policy that 
has called forth a great deal of opposition among all the peoples 
affected. Rather than see French influence extended, the British 
prefer to let the Turks remain in Constantinople. If the French 
thought that putting the Turk out of Constantinople would bring 
the British into control of the region, they would prefc^r to have him 
stay. The French policy was materially helped by opposition within 
the Mohammedan world, chiefly in India, to a removal of the cali- 
phate to Asia.^ The result was a provision of the treaty of Sevres 
(1920) between Turkey and the Allied powers that left Constantinople 
nomiimlly in Turkish hands. 

The tables below show the trade of Smyrna, Trebizond, and Con- 
stantinople; they show also the overpowering strength of British 
shipping in that trade. They indicate how strong is the hold of 

' For a further discussion of the caliphate see page 44 1 . 



416 



The New World 



Importance 
of British 
shipping 



the British upon the coastal regions and towns in areas of commercial 
and strategic importance in the Near East. Indeed, the organized 
commercial life of the whole world at the present time depends upon 
Great Britain to a surprising degree. 

Not only is the through commerce of Constantinople large; the 
city is also the most important focus of Turkish trade. In 1910- 
1911 it had nearly a third of the total import trade of the Turkish 
Empire : 

Commerce of the Principal Ports of the Turkish Empire (1910-11) 

Imports Exports 

Constantinople 31.48% 9.00% 

Smyrna 10.87 20.60 

Saloniki 10.64 5.04 

Beirut 9.98 4.66 

Haidar Pasha Total of 5.94% 

Trebizond 2.24 1.28 

Dedeagatch 1.65 1.82 



Total value of exports in 1910-11 
Total value of imports in 1910-11 



$80,000,000 
150,000,000 



The primacy of British shipping in the Mediterranean region is 
shown by the following figures, which give for the Mediterranean 
and Black seas. Red Sea, and Persian Gulf in 1913-1914 totals of 
(approximately) : 



Tons 



British 14,000,000 

Austro-Hungarian 6,500,000 

Russian 5,500,000 

Turkish 5,000,000 



Tons 

Italian 4,000,000 

French 4,000,000 

German 2,750,000 

Greek 2,250,000 



Dutch, Belgian, and Rumanian, less than 1,000,000 tons each 

For Russian, German, Austro-Hungarian, Greek, and Italian 
shipping, the total is about 1,000,000 tons each for Constantinople, 
with British shipping at 6,500,000 tons. 



THE NEW STATUS 

Constantinople is left in Turkish hands by the terms of the treaty 
of Sevres (1920), and with the city goes a tiny hinterland (Fig. 207). 
AU the rest of Turkey's European possessions are definitely los^ : 

(1) To the Allies, at Suvla Bay, where an international cemetery 
(British, French, and Italian) is to be created for the soldiers 
who died in the ill-fated Gallipoli expedition. 

(2) To Greece, which obtains both Western and Eastern Thrace. 



Constantinople and Its Thoroughfare 417 

The Straits are to be under Allied control ; and the northern coast Constan- 
of Marmara, while under Greek sovereignty, is to be neutral more undei^h 
than nine miles inland. The new status of Constantinople excludes new Aiued 
fortification. The definite intention of the great powers is to secure '^^™* 
the freedom of the surrounding territory. It is thought that there 
is no need even for the fortification of any of the islands in the ^gean. 
Nearly all of these pass to Greece, whose navy is bound to remain too 
small to be a menace either to the great powers or to the security of 
the trade routes of the countries that border the eastern Mediterra- 
nean. Italy secures temporary possession of Rhodes, but as her . 
navy can never rival that of Great Britain or of France, her position 
there is not a matter of great international importance. Statesmen 
are agreed that anything less than free passage of the Straits would 
be a source of irritation both to the people of southern Russia and 
to those of Georgia and Armenia, all of whom desire unrestricted 
passage for goods and ships, including war vessels. 

The principal provisions for the regulation of the neutral zone of 
the Straits, as established by the treaty of Sevres,^ are the following : 

(1) The Straits are to be under the control of a Commission of the 
Straits, composed of representatives of Great Britain, France, 
Italy, Japan, Russia (if and when it becomes a member of 
the League of Nations), the United States (if it is willing 
to participate), Bulgaria (if and when it becomes a member of 
the League), Turkey, and Greece. But nominal sovereignty 
of the zone is divided between the two last-named powers, Con- 
stantinople and the southern shore being Turkish, and the 
north shore west of Constantinople being Greek. 

(2) The Commission is to have complete control of the naviga- 
tion of the Straits, and shall maintain equality of all charges 
or dues, regardless of the port of origin, or destination, or 
departure, or flag, or ownership. Sanitation and the life- i 
saving service also are to be under its control. 

(3) Consular courts have supervision over infringements of the 
laws by their nationals, and in time the Turkish courts are to 
have jurisdiction over their own nationals. 

(4) The Straits are to remain open in peace and in war for all 
craft, and are to be neutral in time of war. They are not to 
be subject to blockade or other hostile act. 

(5) All fortifications within the neutral zone are to be demolished. 

1 At the London Conference of March 1921, various compromises favorable to Turkey 
were discussed. If these are adopted, the treaty of Sevres as outHned in this chapter may 
be greatly modified in Thrace and Smyrna and also with respect to the capitulations and 
the Ottoman Debt. 



CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE 



The Jews 
a minority 
in Palestine 



PALESTINE: A JEWISH HOMELAND UNDER A BRITISH MANDATARY 

Though Palestine is the birthplace of both the Hebraic and the 
Christian religions, neither faith predominates there today. Of 
Christian sects there are a few, the members belonging for the most 
part to religious orders that are associated with the holy places. 
Jews form barely an eighth of the total population of 700,000. The 
rest are chiefly Moslem Arabs, Druses, and Turks. Since there are 
about 15,000,000 Jews in "the world, it is seen that the 80,000 who 
live in Palestine are but a small fraction of the total number. 



Religious 
differences 
likely to 
cause 
trouble to 
the new 
govern- 
ment 



Great 
Britain 
appointed 
the man- 
datary of 
the League 
of Nations 



THE PROPOSED ZIONIST STATE 

The widespread interest in the creation of a new Jewish state, one 
of the chief objects of the Zionist movement, springs from the fact 
that such a state would form a homeland for Jews outside as well as 
inside Palestine and would afford an opportunity to establish a na- 
tion in which Jews might become, in time, the majority race. The 
most serious problem that arises is pohtical control. To turn the 
government of the new state over to either the Jews or the Arabs 
would sow discord at the start. The population has had no expe- 
rience in government, and it would certainly carry into its first 
pohtical contests a fanatical religious feeling that but for outside 
supervision would spell disaster. 

In the Hght of these possibilities there appeared to be but one 
course for the great powers to take : to make a strong western 
power the mandatary. In the treaty of Sevres (1920) it was provided 
that Palestine should be administered by a mandatary, and that this 
mandatary should carry out the terms of the British declaration of 
2 November 1917, which guaranteed the establishment of a Jewish 
national home. At the same time it was specified that the rights of 
non-Jews were not to be prejudiced. 

It was natural to select Great Britain as the mandatary, because 
of her interest in the security of the Suez Canal near by and in the 
orderly behavior of the Arab tribes that adjoin Palestine on the east 
and south. Experienced in controlling unruly peoples of diverse race, 
speech, and rehgious faith. Great Britain, with a strong and mobile 
fleet, will be able to maintain order and thus supply an oppor- 
tunity for the natives to learn the processes of self-government. 
Having been selected as the mandatary, Great Britain proceeded to 

418 



Palestine 419 

appoint a High Commissioner. The announced poUcy of this com- 
missioner is : first, to provide for equahty of treatment of the popula- 
tion elements ; and second, to provide a national home for the Jews, 
permitting them to return to Palestine only as the development of 
that country guarantees the normal absorption of inmiigrants for 
rising industries and reclaimed agricultural lands. 

Jewish colonies began to be established in Palestine as early as the origin of 
16th century, but the principal efforts have been made within the coioSesm 
last fifty or sixty years, partly because of the pogroms and other per- Palestine 
secutions in Russia, and partly for reasons of sentiment. By 1914 
there were in Palestine 46 agricultural colonies, of which 20 were 
in Judea, 7 in Samaria, 16 in GaHlee, and 3 east of the Jordan. They 
vary in population from 20 to more than 3000. The total number 
of colonists is about 12,000. The area of land they cultivate is about 
2 per cent of the whole of Palestine, or possibly 10 per cent of its culti- 
vated area. Most of the colonies are agricultural. A few of them, 
like Telavio, are composed in large part of shopkeepers, teachers, 
and engineers. The colonists produce oranges, olives, grain, dairy 
products, vegetables, and poultry. An agricultural experiment sta- 
tion is maintained by Jews at Haifa. 

/ 

RELATION OF PALESTINE TO THE WORLD 



The decision which has placed Palestine under British control is Foreign in- 
fluences ii 
Palestine 



but one step in a long historical sequence. Foreign influences have ^"®'^*^®^ "* 



always surrounded and permeated Palestine. The seacoasts of 
Syria have called forth from the vast interior of Asia caravan 
and army. Up and down the Mediterranean coast, Turk and 
Egyptian have passed again and again. Doubtless the land would 
have no political individuahty whatever, had it not been for the 
plateau of Judea, a region from 2500 to 3000 feet above the sea, to one 
side of and above the main historical currents of western Asiatic 
life. When the Israelites sought to hold the lower flat land, like the 
Negeb at the southern end of the plateau of Judea, they were driven 
out. The armies of conquest kept to the roads in the fertile coastal 
plains. The Jew stiU looks out, westward from his plateau, across a 
rich coastal plain held by unfriendly people whom he has never been 
able to conquer, except here and there for short periods. 

It was in Samaria, northern Palestine, that outside influences were Samaria 
strongest. Here the trade routes ran just south of the Sea of Galilee the cross- 
to the Plain of Esdraelon and the port of Haifa. Thus they avoided ^^^^^ °* 

western 

the mountains of Lebanon on the north and the rocky plateau of Judea Asia 



420 



The New World 



on the south. Foreign influences penetrated the life of Palestine at 
the north, but were largely shut out of the region of Judea. 

Palestine is a tiny country. Set down in the United States, it 
would cover about the same area as Vermont, and it has about twice 
as many people. It has been called "the least of all lands." Yet so 
mighty a force has emanated from it — the Christian rehgion — that 
its spiritual influence has penetrated every part of the globe. The 
inspiration of the great Crusades of the Middle Ages was the freeing 
of its holy places, then held by the Moslem Turk. It has long been 
a place of pflgrimage for the devout. No other land in the world so 
well illustrates the poUtical force and historical importance of ideas. 
Christ said, "My Kingdom is not of this world," but even the most 
ambitious and forceful rulers of history were unable to acquire em- 
pires whose extent equals that of the Christian realm at the present 
time. 



THE PECULIAR POSITION OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE 

The Jew has spread from his homeland in Palestine throughout the 
world, and he is everywhere marked by strong racial characteristics. 
All told, there are about 15,000,000 Jews in the world, of whom 
4,000,000 live in Russia, about 2,500,000 in Poland, and about 
1,000,000 in former Hungary. There are also large Jewish colonies in 
Constantinople, Saloniki, Barcelona, New York, and London, as well 
as in the larger German cities. 

Wherever he has gone, the Jew has formed a race apart. This 
is due to his religion as well as to his social customs and his personal 
character, and also to the attitude toward him of the peoples among 
whom he has hved. He has been terribly persecuted in Russia, where 
repeated pogroms have had the aspect of wholesale massacres. The 
old Jewish Pale of Settlement in Russia (Fig. 192), east of which 
Jews could not settle, was designed to segregate him. The Rus- 
sian policy resulted in a large concentration of Jews in western 
Russia, particularly in Poland ; and it led also to heavy emigration 
to America. The American Jews are chiefly from Russia and Poland ; 
very few are from Palestine. In Europe the Jew is found in every 
great trading center. In many cities either the local law or the in- 
stinct of the Jew has led him to congregate in a certain section, 
known as the Jewish Quarter, or Ghetto. Normally the Jew has 
maintained a certain aloofness toward the political and social life of 
the country in which he has lived. 

It is a striking fact that in his own country the Jew was histori- 



Palestine 421 

rally not a trader. The Jews of Palestine were a secluded people, The jew 
devoted to agriculture, who went out from their own land across the ^ne a*^ 
sea to distant countries because their own country was small and poor farirer, not 
and because of Roman policy during the first few centuries of the 
Christian era. Thus the race has undergone a complete transformation, 
for the Jew outside of Palestine is preeminently a trader. Indeed, 
a great deal of the general antagonism toward him, on the part of 
other races, is due to his exclusive devotion to trade and personal 
gain and his success therein. 



POSSIBILITIES OF AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT 

The heart of Palestine is the plateau of Judea, flanked on either side Form of 
by lowland. On the west is the fertile, well-watered coastal plain, a ^^^ '*°^ 
hundred miles long and about fifteen wide. The eastern margin is 
abrupt — a very steep scarp that leads down to the Ghor, the flat- 
bottomed depression in which are the Jordan and the Dead Sea, the 
latter more than 1200 feet below sea level. This scarp is the Wilder- 
ness of Judea, a rocky belt of land with steep vaUeys — a barren, 
waterless country, the home of the wandering Bedouin. Here early 
Christians took refuge in caves, and here a few Christian orders still 
maintain monasteries. Eastward, beyond the Ghor, is the Syrian 
desert, broken in three places by tracts of higher and better watered 
country. 

The plateau of Judea ordinarily has enough rainfall for a limited isolated 
agriculture, though there are occasional droughts that turn the grain of^judea 
fields yellow before their time. On the east the aspect changes grad- 
ually. The roUing desert is grassy near the margin of the plateau, 
but parched farther east. In years of extreme drought the nomadic 
Arab comes up to the border of the desert, where the grain fields 
and the settled habitations are located and where fierce feuds arise 
between the settled farmer and the marauding shepherd. Only the 
center of the plateau of Judea has broad fields and fertile vaUeys ; 
here also are the principal towns — Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and He- 
bron ; and here the land is densely inhabited, though the total popu- 
lation is not large (Fig. 43). 

By contrast the Negeb south of the Judean plateau is a desert land, 
uninhabited except for a few small permanent villages supported by 
wells. It is a parched country in strong contrast to the grass-covered 
slopes of the adjacent highlands with their cereal fields, their flocks, 
and their historic cities. 



422 . The New World 

Coastal The coastal region has a rainfall of more than 30 inches a year and 

^^^^ is rich in verdure, except during the dry summer months. The great 

caravan routes of the region run along it. Here also are the populous 
cities and the ports. Four thousand years ago, in the days of Baby- 
lonia and Assyria, and again in the time of the Romans, the caravan 
trade was enormous. The whole region has been smitten by drought 
again and again, throughout its history, as in the terrible years of 
1869 and 1870. 
Large fig Palestine is capable of great agricultural development, a matter 

CTo^for <^f extreme interest in the life of a new state that has practically no 
Palestine mineral deposits. Its climate and soil are so varied from place to place 
in short distances that many plants become adapted to a wide range 
of temperature and rainfall. The olive grows on land from 850 feet 
below sea level in the hot Jordan valley to 2500 feet above sea level 
in upper Galilee and 4000 to 5000 feet at Hermon and in the Leba- 
non, where there are freezing winter temperatures. The fig is grown 
abundantly in upper Galilee, where the population is dense and labor 
cheap, but export is on a small scale, owing to the lack of shipping 
facihties. The crop is sold chiefly to the Bedouins. Grapes are 
grown in large quantities. Besides having a local use, they are car- 
ried by donkey and camel to centers of trade for nomadic peoples on 
the desert's rim. Barley is a standard crop, even in some localities 
having but 10 to 12 inches of rain. 
Water by Water povcrty is the great stumbling block to agricultural devel- 

the°coastar opmcut. As a mcaus of reheving it a Norwegian engineer has 
region proposcd the utilization of the difference in level between the Med- 

iterranean Sea and the Dead Sea. The plan is to construct a tunnel 
some thirty-seven miles long which would carry water from the 
streams of the Mediterranean coastal belt to the lower end of the 
Jordan valley. A more immediately practical plan is to turn into the 
valley lands of northern Palestine a portion of the waters of the Litani 
River and of its tributaries. The necessity of securing additional 
water for irrigation in northern Palestine stimulated the Zionists to 
cliaim a northern boundary which should include most of the Litani 
watershed, but this claim was not allowed in the final settlement of 
the boundary by France and Great Britain (Fig. 209). 
Outer East of the Dead Sea depression is a belt of transition country be- 

borderof twccu Palestine proper and the Syrian desert. Its most important 
permanent member is the Hauran, a plateau rising to 2000-3000 feet above the 
ments ^^^ (^^8* 45). It has rich soil formed on volcanic rock; and though 

it has very few streams, it is sufficiently well watered to have wheat 



Palestine 



423 




424 



The New World 



fields and pastures of wide reputation throughout Syria and the Near 
East. The harvests are sent to Damascus and thence to the port of 
Haifa, formerly by camel caravan, since 1895 by railroad. 

South of the Hauran is the region of Gilead. Its summits rise 
to 4000 feet and support evergreen oak and other trees. Portions 
of the valley floors and plains round about are watered by springs and 
streams and have orchards and vineyards, and occasionally fields of 
wheat and barley. Its chief wealth is in its herds. Like the Hauran, 
the Damascus region, and Moab in the south, Gilead is a land of count- 
less ruins, witnesses of the denser population that once lived here. 

Moab, to the south, completes the line of heights east of the Jordan 
and marks the outpost of the agricultural land at the borders of the 
Syrian desert. Sheep and cattle live in great droves on the upland 
pastures and find water on the canyon floors and at scattered springs. 
It is also a region of agricultural importance, though subject prob- 
ably more than other lands nearby to raids from the desert Arabs, 
who look upon the farmers' fields as placed there by Providence for 
their enjoyment. 




Ras en V 
Nakuras 



BOUNDARY AGREEMENTS 

N 

aVRIA 

FRANCO-BRITISH AGREEMENT 
OF DECEMBER 23,1920 



Fig. 209. Boundary between Syria and Mesopotamia, with related localities, according to the 
text of the Franco-British agreement of 23 December 1920. Only that section of railway is 
shown which is mentioned in the treaty. 



CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX 



ANATOLIA: LAST REMNANT OF THE TURKISH EMPIRE 

Few persons realize how far into Europe the Turk once penetrated Penetra- 
and how dangerously near he came to overwhehning our western ^^°^^°l^ 
civilization. For more than two hundred years he was the aggressor Europe by 
against European peoples, chiefly Germans and Magyars, who bore powe/ 
the brunt of his repeated assaults ; but in 1683, at the second siege 
of Vienna, he was decisively defeated by forces under the Polish 
leader Sobieski, and since then the field of his power has slowly 
diminished. As late as 1908 the Sultan of Turkey was the nominal 
or technical ruler of the Adriatic provinces of Bosnia and Herze- 
govina, although the special position of Austria-Hungary made her em- 
peror the actual ruler. The Mohammedans of Bosnia (chiefly Croats) 
number 30 per cent of the total population of the province ; and it 
is almost as far from Bosnia to Constantinople as from Bosnia to Paris. 
Before the Balkan wars the Turkish Empire was as large as Russia 
in Europe ; its population was nearly as large as that of France. 




^^^ DFCUNF OF THE TURKISH EMPIRE 

Extreme limits I J Losses by |G99 

L- J Losses byl792EiE3 „ „ 1830 

r"1 „ . 1882^^ , . 1908 

914^^ „ , isig 

SCALL OF MILES 

s't"'i 1°" M» 5*° 



Fig. 210. Only the large white area (most of Anatolia) remains to Turkey in unrestricted sov- 
ereignty, though she enjoys limited sovereignty over the Constantinople region and on the 
southern side of the Sea of Marmara. A mere shadow of sovereignty also remains to her at 
Smyrna — the privilege of flying the Turkish flag over one of the outer forts- The western 
border of Armenia is represented in a diagrammatic way ; for details see Figure 225. 

425 



426 



The New World 



Complexity 
of the 
Turkish 
population 




iCafholics 
D Druses 
G Greeks 
J Jews 
K Kurds 
KBKizil-Bash 
L Lazes 



Christians 
P Protestants 
T Turks 

SC Syrian Chris- 
tians 
X Christians 
Orthodox 
Lower case letters after M 
designate component races 

JJB 310 3fe 



Fig. 211. Population of Turkey, with emphasis (by shading) on the Greek and Armenian ele- 
ments. (Figures after the letters represent percentage of the total district population.) 

One of the difficulties of the Turkish rulers is illustrated by the 
table on page 427, which reveals a degree of complexity in the ethnog- 
raphy of Turkey greater than that exhibited by any other empire 
in the world except Russia, with her vast extent, and Great Britain, 
with colonies in every part of the world. To the ethnic differences 
among Turkey's subject peoples were added equally important dif- 
ferences of religion and character. 



Peoples of 
the Turk- 
ish Empire 
separated 
by relief 
and climate 



THE GEOGRAPHICAL ENVIRONMENT 

The task of governing Turkey was further complicated by the na- 
ture of the country. Locally there are rich plains, as about Smyrna, 
about Adana (Cilicia), and at Trebizond and Adrianople ; but, as 
shown in Figure 213, a mountainous relief is characteristic of a large 
part of the border of the Anatolian plateau. The interior of Arabia is 
chiefly desert. The Turkish possessions in western Arabia — Hedjaz, 
Asir, and Yemen — were so remote and little known that Turkish 
sovereignty there was but a shadow. We commonly fail to 
appreciate their distance from the center of Turkish authority. 
Arabia is about half as large as that part of the United States west 
of the Mississippi (Fig. 29). It is as far from Constantinople to 
Mocha at the southwestern tip of Arabia as it is from New York to 
San Francisco. Outside of the Balkans, Anatolia, and the Syrian 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 427 

Classification of the Peoples op Asiatic Tubket ^ 



TiJLlIB 


Race 


Relioion 


Speech 


Homeland 


Estimated 
Ndmbek 


Alevis (sep 












Tahtajls) 












Ansariyehs 


Armenoid 


Monotheistic 


Arabic 


Syrian Mts. and Cili- 
cian plains 


175,000 


Aptals 


Armenoid 


Sunni 


Arabic 


Syrian Mts. 


uncertain 


Arabs 


Semitic 


Mohammedan 


Arabic 


South of Tauric and 
Armenian Mts. 


300,000 ? 


Arameans 


Semitic 


Hebrew 


Aranjean 


Mesopotamia 


300 


Armenians 


Armenoid 


Christian 


Armenian 
(Aryan) 


Armenian highland, 
Taurus and Anti- 


1,000,000 - 


Asdlas (see 








Taurus ranges 




Yezidls) 












Avshars 


TurW 


Shla 


Turkish 


Anti-Taurus 


uncertain 


Ballkis 


Armenoid 


Mixed Moham- 
medan and 
Christian 


Mixed Arabic, 
Kurdish, and 
Armenian 


Near Sasun 


uncertain 


Be]van3 


Semitic 


Mixed Moham- 
medan and 
Christian 


Arabic 


Near Mosul 


uncertain 


Chaldeans 


Semitic 


Roman Catholic 


Syriac, 
Kurdish. 


Near Diarbekr and 
Jezireh ; Sert and 


50,000 


Chepmls (see 






and Arabic 


Khabur basin 




Tahtajis) 












Circassians 


Mixed Turlii and 
Indo-European 


IMohammedan 


Turkish 


Anatolia, N. SjTla, 
N. Mesopotamia 


500,000 


Druses 


Armenoid 


Mohammedan 


Arabic 


Lebanon ; Anti-Leba- 
non, Hauran Mts., 
around Damascus 


200,000 


Gr20k3 3 


Mediterranean 


Christian 


Greek 


Coast districts, min- 
ing districts, large 
cities 


2,000,000 


Ismallyehs 


Armenoid 


Mohammedan 


Semitic 


Northern Syria 


22,000 


Jacobites 


Semitic 


Christian (Mono- 
IJhysitcG) 


Syriac 


Syria, Mesopotamia 


15,000 


Jews 


Mixed Semitic, 
Mediterranean, 
and Armenoid 


Hebrew 


Hebrew 


Jerusalem : environs 
of Damascus 


150,000 


Karapapaka 


Turk! 


Shla 


Turkish 


Tutakh-Patnoz 


3,000 


Kizilbash 


Armenoid mixed 


Shia, or mixture of 


Turkish 


Angora and Sivas vil- 


400,000 




with Turk! 


Shiism, Pagan- 
ism, Manichse- 
ism, and Chris- 
tianity 


' 


ayets; Dersim 




Kurds 


Indo-European 


Mohammedan 


Aryan lan- 
guages 


West of the Sakaria 
River ; Kurdistan 


1,500,000 


Lazis 


Georgian branch of 
the Cacaso-Ti- 
betan peoples 


Mohammedan 


Grusinian 


Lazistan : north of 
Choruk Su, around 
Riza 


uncertain 


Maronites 


Armenoid 


Christian 


Arabic 


Mt. Lebanon, Anti- 
Lebanon 


3.50,000 


Metauilehs 


Probably Armenoid 


Shla 


Arabic 


Northern Lebanon 


under .50,000 


Nestorians 


Armenoid 


Christian 


Syriac 


Basin of the Great 
Zab ; valleys of the 
Bohtan and Kha- 
bar 


60,000 


New Chaldeans 


Semitic 


Christian 


Syriac 


Alkosh 


uncertain 


Sabeans 


Semitic 


Christian 


SjTiac 


Amarar and Munte- 
fik sanjaks of the 
Basra vilayet 


3,000 


Samaritans 


Semitic 


Hebrew 


Hebrew 


Near Nablus 


300 


Syrians 


Semitic 


Christian and Mo- 
hammedan 


Arabic 


Syria and Mesopo- 
tamia 


uncertain 


Tahtajis 


Armenoil 


Mohammedan 


Turkish 


Lycian Mts. 


5,000 


Tatars 


Turki 


Mohammedan 


Turkish 


Anatolia and Cillcian 


25,000 


Tereltlmans (see 








plains 




Karapapalis) 












Turkomans 


Turki 


Mohammedan 


Turkish 


Angora, Adana, and 
Aleppo vilayets 


uncertain 


Turks 


Turki mixed with 

Armenoid 
Mixed Armenoid 


Mohammedan 


Turkish 


Anatolia mainly 


8,000,000 


Yezidis or Asdais 


Devil-worshipers, 


KermanjI 


Kurt Dagh on the W. 


40,000 




and Indo- 


mixture of the 




to Zakho E. of the 






European 


old Babylonian 
religion ; Zoroas- 
t r 1 a n i s m . 
M a n i e h ae i s m, 
and Christianity 




Tigris; Bad! near 
Mosul ; Sin jar 
range 




Yuruks 


Armenoid 


Mohammedan 


Turkish 


Konia vilayet 


200,000 


Total 










15,048.600 













1 From Leon Dominlan, The Frontiers of Language and Nationality in Europe, 1917. 

2 The figures for Armenians and Greeks require revision in view of the systematic efforts of the Turks to extirpate 
these two peoples. The masscres of the entire Greek population of villages of the ^gean coasts and the atrocities 
perpetrated on the Armenians of inland communities have largely depleted these two Christian subject groups. 

3 Hellenes, or subjects of the King of Greece, number about 20,000. 

region, there were almost no railroads in the Turkish Empire, and 
there has always been a central administration whose effects could 
hardly have been oiFset in any circumstances. 



428 



The New World 




Fig. 212. Population densities in Turkey by sanjaks, after statistics for 1911. Figures 
on the map represent density per square mile. 




Meters Under 500 
Feel Under 1650 



1650-3300 



so 100 



Fig. 213. Relief of Anatolia. Note the plateau character of the peninsula, its abrupt and 
indented border, and interior valleys and basins. Of special interest is a comparison of new 
boundaries and of ethnic distributions in Figures 210 and 211 with the coastal valley lowlands as 
represented here. Contours reduced from the sheets of the millionth map, Bgritish General Staff, 



I 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 429 

The strong and varied relief of the Turkish regions and the great 
differences of cHmate from place to place have had a marked effect 
upon the division and mode of life of the people. The Turks are 
largely confined to the mountain-rimmed and partly desert high- 
lands of Anatolia ; Judea is a relatively dry and inaccessible plateau 
where the Hebrew race had its early development ; the Armenian race 
grew up in the high vaUey floors about Lake Van ; the Syrians hold a 
fertile strip of land along the Mediterranean, shut off by the moun- 
tains of Lebanon on the south and the Syrian desert on the east; 
the semi-nomadic Kurds keep largely to the mountain pastures at the 
headwaters of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers ; the Arabs live inde- 
pendently in the oases of the vast interior desert of Arabia or in 
locally fertile districts about the desert border. Each people has a 
distinctive homeland.^ 

HISTORICAL RELATIONS AND POLICIES 

The complexities of race have also in part grown out of a long Military 
and changeful history. Military expeditions of the past, no less <^^™p^ig"s 
than commercial life, passed and repassed the sites of modern tribes. Turkey 
Hittite and Syrian, Persian and Greek, Egyptian and Assyrian and 
Babylonian, European crusader and Moslem, Arab, and Turk, sent 
their armies across this part and that to capture towns, take spoils, 
enslave peoples, or guard a highway of approach. 

The great Eurasian trade and poUtical movements have involved Historic 
some part of the Turkish Empire — sometimes all of it — ever since ^'^^^^ , 

^ ^ ^ ^ routes of 

its formation. Armenia was a meeting place of the inner trade routes ; Turkey 
Syria was the maritime outlet of the hinterland trade ; Mesopotamia 
and the Persian GuK region were a focus of eastern commerce. Im- 
portant towns grew up at critical places ; Haifa is an historic port 
where caravans gathered; Mosul, or "Central Gates," is near a high 
pass leading up to Armenia ; Konia, once the capital of Turkey, was at 
a desert meeting-place of north-south and east-west routes in Anatolia ; 
Aleppo was a focus for traffic about the shores of the Gulf of Alexan- 
dretta. 

When the Turk captured Constantinople from the Byzantine rulers Diversion 
in 1453 and thus completed control of the gateways to Asia and the °/^^g®°*^* 
rich trade of India, European traders earnestly sought a new route to 

^ This chapter deals only with the Turks and the region of Anatolia. For discussion of 
non-Turkish groups formerly included in the Turkish Empire see the chapters on Greece, 
Transcaucasia, Palestine, France (for Syria), and Great Britain (for Mesopotamia, Arabia, 
and Egypt). 



430 



The New World 




Fig. 214. In the desert of Syria. A tribe of Anezeh Arabs moving from an exhausted pasture 

to a fresh one. 



Oppres- 
sion of 
subject 
peoples 



India, for with increasing risks of trade over the old route went 
higher costs. Finally Dias discovered the southern end of Africa 
(1488), and soon after a new and all- water route to India which 
avoided the Turk was found by Da Gama (1498). The Suez Canal 
in our own time (completed in 1869) diverted trade still further from 
the old caravan routes across Asia Minor. 

The troubles of Turkey in modern times have arisen in large part 
because of the uninterrupted government policy of oppression of 
subject races. The present partition of the Turkish Empire calls 
for a just disposition of these races, to the end that there may be a 
reasonable chance of future peace and hberty. Let us now examine 
the political basis of the problem. 

Almost all the oppressed peoples of the world would have said 
that once the old autocratic political systems of Germany, Austria- 
Hungary, Russia, and Turkey were destroyed, everything would be 
set going again without delay in an era of democracy and happiness. 
They have found instead that they have merely shifted a great many 
of the most trying political and economic problems from their former 
rulers to themselves. Not everything that the past administration 
had done was wrong, and in any case it had kept the affairs of the coun- 
try running in one way or another. Granted the old system had to be 
destroyed, it was equally necessary that a new one be created to take 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 431 

its place. A period of revolution must be followed by a period of 
building. 

There are two regions in which the people have not yet begun the Disor- 
building process — Russia and Turkey. Their territories join in the of ^e**'°° 
Caucasus, and there is now a great block of unsettled country extend- huge em- 
ing all the way from the Indian Ocean to the Arctic. Turkey and 

The historic weakness of the Turkish Empire was due primarily ^"^sia 
to two causes : 

(1) The country's central situation at one of the greatest cross- 
roads of the world and its bridge-Uke character between central 
Asia and southeastern Europe. 

(2) The inclusion of a large number of different peoples in a low 
stage of development. 

It will help us to understand the present problems of the Turkish Historical 
people and the difficulties of the European nations who now have mYnt oT 
assumed control of the former empire, to look for a moment at the **\® J""^^" 

. , ish Empire 

rise and spread of Turkish power. A background of historical 
facts is in this case peculiarly important. 
The Turks £ire made up of two chief branches : 

(1) The Seljuk Turks, whose original home was in Mongolia ; they 
conquered Anatolia from the Byzantines (8th century) and im- 
posed the Turkish language and the Mohammedan religion on 
the inhabitants that remained after conquest. 

(2) The Ottoman Turks, who migrated westward from the Altai 
Mountains and the plateaus of Inner Asia; they supplanted 
the Seljuk Turks, founding an empire in 1326, with the capi- 
tal at Brusa. Later (1371) Adrianople became the Turkish 
capital. 

In the eight years from 1512 to 1520, the Turks conquered Syria, 
Egypt, and the holy places of Mecca and Medina. By the latter ac- 
tion, Sultan Selim I of that time became the "Defender of the Mos- 
lem Faith," and made himself Caliph, or Head of the Church. 

His successor, Suleiman, pushed the Mohammedan conquests 
far into Europe, besieging Vienna in 1529, though without success. 
In 1565 Malta likewise was besieged. Thereafter there was a decline 
in Turkish power, especially after the defeat of the Turkish navy at 
Lepanto in 1571 and the second siege of Vienna, which ended disas- 
trously for the Turks in 1683. 

Wherever they extended their conquests outside of Anatolia, the 
Turks forcibly Islamized the Christians, drafted their young men 



432 



The New World 



into the army, and placed many of the girls in the Turkish harems. 
This policy kept the Turkish stock in Asia Minor from being wasted 
in foreign battlefields and swelled the numbers of Moslems. 

During the 18th century Hungary was lost to the Turks. Then 
followed the loss of the northern shore of the Black Sea. In the 
early part of the 19th century the Greeks and Serbs successfully 
rose against the Turk, and from that time down to recent years the 
pressure of the Christian against the Turk has been almost unremitting. 
But for the antagonism between the Russian and British empires, 
the struggle might have ended long ago in the expulsion of the Turk 
from Europe. 

Internal difficulties in the Turkish Empire, and even revolution 
against the Turkish authorities, continued until in 1876 the liberal 
elements were able to force the introduction of a constitution and a 
parliament. But conflicting racial and rehgious interests were so 
strong that the parliament no sooner set to work than it showed itself 
impotent ; and in the long period from 1876 to 1909 Sultan Abdul 
Hamid II held the reins of power exclusively in his own hands. He 
fought western liberal ideas in his court and in the country, and tried • 
to make Pan-Islamism a poHtical force. Through it he hoped to 
continue his leadership of the Moslem world and to exercise strong 
political influence among the Moslem populations of : 

(1) Great Britain, in India, Egypt, eastern Africa, etc. 

(2) France, in northern Africa. 

(3) Russia, on the northern Black Sea coast, in Transcaucasia, 
and in Russian Turkestan. 



" Young 
Turk " 
revolution 
of igo8 



THE REVOLUTION OF 1908 AND THE NATIONALIST POLICY OF 
THE YOUNG TURKS 

Only a few years before the World War the autocratic policy of the 
Sultan was most unexpectedly interrupted, with profound effects 
upon the subsequent history of Turkey, and indeed of the world. 
In July 1908 the Young Turks came into power, overthrowing the 
ruling party and forcing the reactionary Sultan to restore the con- 
stitution of 1876. It was thought that the period of liberty and 
freedom had at last set in ; there was the greatest excitement and 
rejoicing all through Turkey. The Greeks of Smyrna, the Alba- 
nians in Europe, the Armenians, the Arabs, and even the Turks them- 
selves said that the day of deliverance had come. The racial and 
religious hatreds seemed to disappear in a day; and in their place 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 433 

came the spirit of good will. There was almost equal rejoicing abroad 
when it was recalled how badly governed Turkey had been, how many 
of her own citizens she had massacred, how rotten was her internal 
organization. 

At first the troubles of the Young Turks were due to the efforts of the Abdication 
old regime to regain control. After a mutiny in the army at Constan- °^n^^ ^"^' 
tinople had been put down, the Young Turk party made the Sultan 
a prisoner at Saloniki and put his brother, Mohammed V, in his 
place. 

Then began the rule of the Young Turks. Their first thought was Proposed 
given to a great nationahzing movement known as "Pan-Islamism," Xhamme- 
by which the scattered units of the entire Mohammedan world were dan eie- 
to become federated in a vast political system. The power of Islam Pan-isiam- 
was to be consolidated. Even Finland and Hungary were to be ^^'^ 
brought into the scheme. United Turkey was to form the center 
of the Islamic world, though permitting distant peoples, like the 
Arabs of Egypt, Morocco, and Tunis, and the people of Persia and 
Afghanistan, to enjoy local autonomy. 

To further their objects and stimulate popular enthusiasm, the 
officials and teachers idealized such barbarian leaders as Attila and 
Genghis Khan and wrote in poetic style of the glories of these so-called 
heroic figures. Scholars and writers formed clubs, published books, 
and held celebrations to revive Turkish hero worship. 

One phase of the movement was attention to national economic 
problems. The leaders asserted that as long as trade and industries 
were in foreign hands the Turk was not in power. The Greek and 
Armenian traders and shopkeepers were persecuted, boycotted, and 
expelled, and national banks were started, as at Aidin and Konia. 

But the Young Turks failed from the very beginning. They be- Failure of 
gan to oppress the subject races ; made no effort to punish the men lj)^jg°"°^ 
who had carried out the terrible Adana massacres of 1909, in which 
more than 30,000 Christians were kiUed ; tried to suppress the liberties 
of the Greek Orthodox Church ; started a commercial boycott of the 
Greeks; and sought forcibly to colonize Macedonia by bringing in 
Mohammedans from other parts of Turkey. Instead of bringing to- 
gether the diverse peoples of their empire, the Young Turks in the end 
only started into fiercer life the age-old racial and religious hatreds. 

These events made men despair of a solution of the Turkish prob- 
lem by the Turks. All the old ambitions of race, rehgion, or na- 
tionality revived. The Armenians wished to be free; the Balkan 
states banded together to throw the Turk out of Europe ; Czar Fer- 



434 



The New World 



Young 
Turk revo- 
lution the 
first of a 
long chain 
of events 



Russian, 
Italian, 
and Brit- 
ish spheres 



Rise of the 
Trans- 
caucasian 
people 



Italian 
occupation 
of the 
Dode- 
canese 



dinand of Bulgaria proclaimed his country entirely detached from 
Turkish rule ; Austria formally annexed Bosnia ; Italy seized Tripoli, 
and forced Turkey to conclude peace in 1912. Instead of good will 
and fraternity, there was redoubled hatred and war and the setting 
into motion of that long series of events that through the Balkan 
wars led finally to the World War of 1914-1918. 

ZONES OF INFLUENCE OF THE GREAT POWERS 

One of the most serious consequences of the lamentable events 
that occurred in Turkey at the end of the old and the beginning 
of the new regime was the renewed ambition of the great powers 
to gain larger spheres of influence in Turkey, so that if the empire 
vanished they should have richer spoils. 

It wiU be seen by Figure 47 that Russia was to have the whole 
northern Armenian region, not as sovereign territory but as a sphere 
of commercial and political influence, which meant that if the Turk- 
ish Empire disintegrated, Russia would hope to own this part of it. 
Italy was to have special rights in Adalia and Dodecanesia. France 
was given a similar position in the Adana region, Syria, and southern 
Armenia ; whfle England was to have a sort of protectorate over Pales- 
tine and Mesopotamia. These arrangements were made as late as 
1916, during the war. 

With the complete coUapse of orderly government in Russia in 1917, 
the Russian sphere fades from the map of Turkey and in its place 
there appear three countries — Armenia, the Georgian RepubHc, 
and the country of the Azerbaijan Tatars (Fig. 220). Each one de- 
sired an independent existence, though repeatedly attempts have been 
made to unite the three in a Transcaucasian confederation. 

The Italian zone at Adalia represents a recent ambition. \Mien 
the Turkish Empire was in a state of disorder in 1911, Ital^ sought 
to increase her territorial holdings in Africa by acts of aggression in 
Libya (Tripoli). Austria-Hungary had seized the provinces of Bosnia 
and Herzegovina, Bulgaria had declared her independence of Turkey 
— why should Italy not have Libya ? War with Turkey followed. 
It was a hard campaign, and before it was won Italy seized the group 
of islands known as the Dodecanese, from which she was to with- 
draw as soon as Turkish troops were withdrawn from Libya. Italy 
also obtained railway concessions in the Adalia region from the weak 
Turkish government, and strengthened her hold upon the coal mines 
of Heraclea on the southern Black Sea coast east of Constan- 
tinople. 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 435 
As the World War progressed, it became more and more impor- Greeks 



of the 
Dode- 



tant for the Allies to have the aid of Greece, on account of the progress 
of German operations in the Balkans and the possibihty of a sub- canese 
marine campaign with the Greek coast as a base. Greek adherence 
to the Allied cause could be won only if the Greeks felt that there 
would be a chance, after the war, to unite the Greek populations of 
the JEgean. Wliile there was no agreement to this effect, there was 
a tacit understanding. Now the islands known as the Dodecanese 
(Fig. 158) are exclusively Greek in customs, language, and religion. 
Neither the Turks through centuries of rule, nor the Italians in a 
few years, could change the fundamental character of the people. 
To this day the sailors of Dodecanesia maintain the Hellenic tra- 
ditions of the past. Moreover, the islands He near that part of the 
mainland of Asia Minor that is predominantly Greek, and that has 
Smyrna for its capital. By the treaty of Sevres^ between Turkey 
and the Allied powers the islands were ceded to Italy and have since 
been again transferred by treaty to Greece (except Rhodes). ^ 

THE POLICY OF CAPITULATIONS 

Whatever their location and character, the Turks are poor, and Turkish 
the standard of education is low. As a result, almost all the business j'ufmess 

. in foreign 

of the country is in the hands of non-Turkish people — Armenians, hands 
Greeks, Jews, Italians, French, Germans, and EngUsh. Wherever 
mines have been developed, railroads or irrigation works constructed, 
foreign capital and foreign brains have been chiefly responsible. 

At first thought it might be supposed that foreign assistance would PrivUeges 
be nothing but a benefit to Turkey. And so it would, if it were not fi^^^^^°^' 
that foreigners occupy a privileged position in the country. In fact, 
citizens of Great Britain, Italy, France, Germany, and Austria-Hun- 
gary were in many respects in a separate class from Turkish citizens, 
whether Turks, Greeks, Armenians, or Jews. A citizen of any of the 
great powers was practically exempt from the payment of income taxes 
and several other kinds of taxes to which the Turk was subject. He 
was immune from search, could secure passports from his own consul, 
and could be tried in courts of his own nationality. AU these spe- 
cial privileges together constituted a body of privileges known as 
"capitulations." One entire region, the Lebanon, was placed in 

1 The treaty of Sevres is discussed here and elsewhere as if it had been ratified, but rati- 
fication by Turkey had not taken place as late as 1 June 1921. See footnote on page 417. 

- For a more detailed discussion of the Dodecanese and of foreign spheres of influence in 
this region see the chapters on Greece and Constantinople. 



436 



The New World 




Fig. 215. Navigation and harbor rights and concessions in Turkey in 1914. Railroads from 
the Geographical Journal, April 1920 ; Dominian, The Frontiers of Language and Nationality 
in Europe, 1917 ; and British General Staff map, Railways in Asiatic Turkey, No. 2246, 
1911. 1:7,500,000. 



Turkey as 
a field for 
political 
rivalry 



a privileged class and passed under foreign control in 1864. Upon 
declaring war in 1914, Turkey abolished the capitulations, but the 
powers refused to recognize her action. 

It should not be thought, however, that the capitulations sprang 
from a purely selfish desire on the part of foreign powers to control 
Turkish affairs. It was found that foreigners were ill treated, given 
unfair trials in the courts, and unnecessarily delayed in their legiti- 
mate business by Turkish officials. The case was parallel to that of 
China (page 514). 

Each nation which has in the past secured business concessions 
in Turkey wishes to retain and develop to its own advantage all the 
property that it formerly held, and these rights are now to be con- 
firmed by treaty. It is difficult to see how this can be done and at 
the same time the natural growth of Turkey be assured. By the 
terms of the treaty of Sevres (1920) consular courts would hereafter 
have supervision over all infringements of the laws by their nationals 
within the area of the neutral zone of Constantinople and the Straits. 
Furthermore, until such time as Turkish judicial procedure becomes 
better regulated, the Tm-kish courts will relegate jurisdiction over their 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 437 

own nationals in the neutralized area to courts of the Allied powers. 
Outside of Constantinople — that is, in Anatolia — there is to be 
put into effect a plan of judicial reform, to be drafted by the principal 
Allied powers with the help of technical experts of other powers for- 
merly related to the scheme of capitulations. This plan is to replace 
the former capitulatory system as far as that system related to judi- 
cial matters. 

Political life had never been anything but corrupt in the whole Political 
history of Turkey ; but with the capitulations went increasing cor- <^°"^P^i°° 
ruption. Officials sought bribes at every opportunity, withheld the 
proceeds of a vicious and discriminatory tax system, ruined every 
struggling industry by graft, and fought with massacre every show 
of independence on the part of Turkey's many subject peoples. 

To these difficulties were added pressure from without and revolu- 
tion within. The Russians persistently sought access to the Mediter- 
ranean through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles ; the Bulgarians 
and Serbs secured large autonomy and, later, complete independence ; 
Macedonia was perpetually in disorder ; the Greek people of Smyrna 
sought union with Greece. 

THE OTTOMAN PUBLIC DEBT 

The question of debt was politically important to Turkey even 
before the World War. Should the treaty of Sevres be ratified, it 
will be fundamental and vital; for with the control of her public 
debt are related still larger schemes of political control, through which 
the commercial interests of the world will seek to gain advantages 
that may not be to Turkey's interest. 

The total pre-war debt of Turkey originally amounted to Adminis- 
$716,000,000. France, the chief creditor, had 60 per cent of the juSeVs 
total, Germany came next with 20 per cent, and Great Britain pre-war 
next with 15 per cent. The debt was administered by a Council 
of Administration of the Ottoman Public Debt, which consisted 
of one representative each for France, Great Britain, Holland, Ger- 
many, Austria-Hungary, Italy, and Turkey, and one representa- 
tive of the Imperial Ottoman Bank. The president of the Council 
was a Frenchman or a Britisher in alternate years. 

Now let us see how the debt affected the political and economic importance 
life of Turkey. In the first place, the Council controlled many of the ^J°^^^^^ 
important revenues of the empire. If there was a loan to be raised, control 
it was the Council that administered the service of the loan. If money 
had to be found to pay the interest or the principal, the Council col- 



438 



The New World 



Need for 
abolition 
of special 
privileges 



French and 

British 

rivalry 



Present 
adminis- 
tration of 
the debt 



lected a certain amount of the ordinary revenues. The Council 
had reached into almost every corner of Turkish financial affairs. Its 
control even went so far as to affect the tax on live stock in certain 
districts. On the other hand, it introduced modern methods in cer- 
tain industries, and was the principal influence in establishing the silk 
industry. Its staff of trained employees totaled nearly 9000 in 1912. 

Students of the Turkish problem have long held that if Turkish 
affairs are to be improved, the exclusive privileges involved in the 
public debt and in the concessions must be modified or abolished. 
They assert further that it would be greatly to Turkey's interest if 
all the revenues of the state were controlled by a central treasury, 
instead of by many collecting and disbursing agencies, as in the 
past. So complicated are these financial affairs as they now stand, 
so poor is Turkey since the World War (she had already lost one tenth 
of her revenue and one sixth of her population in the Balkan wars 
of 1912-1913), so great is the rivalry of the powers, that it was impos- 
sible to make Turkey pay a war indemnity comparable to that which 
has been demanded of the other defeated powers. The principle of 
reparations was set aside by the Peace Conference of Paris, and in its 
place full validity was given to the pre-war Ottoman Public Debt. 

Owing to the importance of the Ottoman debt in the political de- 
velopment and administration of the Turkish Empire, France and 
Great Britain naturally were jealous of each other in this field. French 
sentiment was opposed to a Brit'sh mandate for Constantinople, and 
England objected to French occupation. Moreover, there will be an 
inevitable conflict between the obligations of the old debt, chiefly held 
by France, and the obligations of the new debt that must be incurred 
to provide a financial basis for government — for the engineering 
works that are required to provide sanitation in the cities, and railway 
facilities and irrigation works for potentially rich but undeveloped 
regions. 

Under the treaty of Sevres signed between Turkpy and the Allied 
powers, the Ottoman Public Debt is to be administered as before. 
It will be in charge of a council composed of British, French, and 
Italian representatives, and the Council is to levy all revenues 
intrusted to its management before 1 November 1914. In order 
to regulate the income of Turkey and provide for the interest and 
sinking fund necessary for the debt, there will be appointed a 
Director General of Customs. It is further arranged that all de- 
tached states — that is, Mesopotamia, Armenia, etc. — are to assume 
a share of the Ottoman Pubhc Debt as it stood before 1 November 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 439 

1914, the amount they assume being proportional to the amount of 
their average revenue and the ratio between the latter and the 
average revenue of the whole of Turkey. 

The Council is to operate until the Ottoman Public Debt has been 
liquidated. When this result has been achieved, Turkey is to con- 
sult the Council of the League of Nations to decide whether further 
advice and administrative and financial assistance are necessary, 
and if so, in what form. 

The administration of the Ottoman Public Debt will be facilitated The treaty 
by a financial commission, for which the Alhes have arranged, to con- pract>caiiy 

*' ' ^ ' an Allied 

serve and increase the resources of Turkey. When we consider that receivership 
there will also be an Interallied commission of control and organiza- 
tion to supervise the execution of the military clauses of tlic treaty 
of Sevres, it is clear that the new goveri merit of Turkey will be for 
all practical purposes in the hands of the principal Allied powers. 
Added to the control delegated to these organizations is the provision 
that all concessions prior to 1914 are conserved and confirmed ; this 
also means that the inlluence of outside powers upon Turkish internal 
affairs is confirmed and increased. The control of outside powers is 
not limited to military and financial matters alone, but applies also 
to import and export duties, to the reorganization of the electoral 
system, and to the proportional representation of the races within 
Turkish frontiers. 

OTHER TERMS OF THE TREATY OF SEVRES 

Allied control over Turkish financial matters extends even to the Financial 
approval or supervision of the national budget, financial laws and 
regulations, and the improvement of the Turkish currency. Neither 
the tax system, nor the customs system, nor internal or external loans, 
nor new concessions, may be arranged without the consent of the 
financial commission of the Allied powers. To jjrovide against the 
economic penetration of Turkish territory by Germany, Austria, 
Hungary, or Bulgaria, the Allies may liquidate the property of citi- 
zens of those countries in Turkish territories. If the liquidation 
affects government property, the proceeds are to be turned over to 
the Reparations Commission set up by the earlier treaties of peace 
with Germany, Austria, and Bulgaria. Turkish property rights in 
certain railway companies pass out of German control. 

Finally, Turkey is required to grant freedom of transit to persons. Freedom of 
goods, vessels, etc., passing through her territory, and such goods transit 
in transit are to be free of all customs duties. Rates of transport 



440 



The New World 



Outlets for 
Trans- 
caucasia 



Indemnity 
but not full 
reparation 



Rise of a 
Turkish 
Nationalist 
movement 



are to be reasonable, regardless of the ownership or nature of the 
means of transport. To insure the carrying out of these provisions 
in commercially strategic places, certain ports are declared to be of 
international interest. In these ports all states that are members of 
the League of Nations are to enjoy complete freedom and equality 
of treatment, particularly in the matter of charges and facilities. In 
all of them there are to be "free zones." The ports are : Constanti- 
nople from St. Stefano to Dolma Bagtchi, Haidar-Pasha, Smyrna, 
Alexandretta, Haifa, Basra, Trebizond, and Batum. 

Though Georgia, Azerbaijan, Persia, and Russian Armenia lie 
outside the Turkish frontier, the treaty provides for free access on the 
part of these four states to the Black Sea by the port of Batum. To 
Armenia are granted special facilities in the use of the port of Trebi- 
zond, where she obtains a lease of an area for her own use. 

In view of the loss of territory which Turkey incurs as a result of 
the treaty of peace, she is not required to pay a general reparation 
biU; but she is required to pay indemnities due on account of the 
claims of the Allied powers for reparation for damages suffered by non- 
Turkish people. These claims are to cover losses or damages suffered 
by civilian nationals (as distinct from losses to military forces) of the 
Allied powers during the war and up to the time that the treaty of 
peace goes into effect. In addition, Turkey must pay the expenses 
of the military forces of occupation since 30 October 1918. 

THE NEW NATIONALIST PARTY 

With the collapse of Turkish military power in 1918, the occupa- 
tion of Constantinople and adjacent waters by an Allied army and 
fleet, and the threat of dismemberment, Turkish sentiment for the 
integrity of the Turkish Empire crystalKzed in the form of a Nation- 
alist party. Organized in October 1919, the new party soon carried 
Adrianople and Brusa. It had the whole interior of Anatolia in 
which to develop, for only the coastal regions were held by the Allies. 
The French were attacked and defeated at Marash late in February 
1920 ; and their retreat was accompanied by a fresh massacre of 
Armenians in the Cilician region. The British were harassed on the 
borders of Kurdistan by tribesmen who were instigated by Turkish 
officials. The Greek forces that held the demarcation line at Smyrna 
were hard pressed. The AUied armies had largely disbanded, and the 
greater part of the world was stricken with disorganization and laden 
with debt. 

Seeing these influences at work, and seeing also their own country 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 441 

disintegrating, the Turkish leaders revived the national sentiment 
and spurred their people to new efforts to defeat the scattered bat- 
talions of the Allies and regain the empire. In the hope of arrest- 
ing Nationalist ambitions, the suggestion was made in a number of 
quarters, particularly in France, that there should be Allied super- 
vision of Turkish officials, without actual replacement. 

It is of course a serious question whether Turkey will ratify in good wm 
faith the treaty of Sevres with the Allied powers. If the Nationalist Jligcation 
movement becomes stronger, and if at the same time there should be a have any 
growing reluctance on the part of the strong western powers to spend ^^ '*^ 
money in maintaining order in Turkey, few of the provisions of the 
treaty will have any force. If the provisions are accepted in good 
faith, the government of Turkey will be but a shadow. The Turk- 
ish army is limited to 50,000 men, of whom 35,000 are to be a gen- 
darmerie organized and maintained for the purpose of keeping internal 
order. Turkey will have no fortresses left under her exclusive con- 
trol. She merely flies a flag over one of the outer forts of Smyrna, 
while the forts in the Straits region are to be demolished within 
three months of the signing of the treaty. 

THE QUESTION OF THE CALIPHATE 

A question of importance to Turkey is that of the caliphate, or Division of 
headship of the Moslem church. The Turkish Cahph's claim of of^^onand 

^ , oi religious 

descent Irom the Prophet is not recognized as authentic by important authority 
elements both without and within the Turkish Empire. The Sultan 
of Morocco, the Mahdists of the Egyptian Sudan, the Senussi in 
the Libyan Desert, the Wahabis in central Arabia, have never made 
acknowledgment of the Turkish Caliph. Nor has such recognition 
been given by the Arabs of the Hedjaz, Palestine, and Syria, which 
contain the holy places of Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem. Today, 
throughout the country from Mecca to Aleppo, the Sultan's name 
has been replaced in the Friday liturgy by that of Sherif Hussein, 
the hereditary guardian of the holy cities of the Hedjaz, who is 
referred to as "The Commander of the Faithful," though he has 
himself not assumed the title of Caliph. On the other hand the 
Moslems of India and of Anatolia have always supported the 
Turkish caliphate (page 415). 

In spite of these divergent views as to the caliphate, the fact remains Religious 
that it is the Caliph at Constantinople who is the center of the Otto- ofconsta" 
man Empire and the concrete force that stands for the Islamic cause ^^^°^^^ ^ 

. confirmed 

m the world, and it is a matter of import whether he shall retain his 



442 



The New World 



residence in Constantinople, the seat of authority for many genera- 
tions. The Turks feared that if this seat were transferred to inner 
AnatoHa, Moslem faith and Moslem political power would diminish 
throughout the world and lose ground in the struggle with Chris- 
tianity and other religions. It was the pressure of the Moslems of 
India upon British leaders and French desire to prevent British com- 
mercial control of a possible free state at Constantinople that turned 
the scale in favor of the Turk and left him at least a shadow of au- 
thority in his capital. Moslem faith is still dominated from Con- 
stantinople, though as a mihtary center its power has disappeared. 



Natural 
limits of 
Anatolia 



Treaty 
agreements 
respecting 
lost prop- 
erty and 
protection 
of minori- 
ties re- 
maining in 
the new 
Turkey 



ETHNIC AND ECONOMIC BASIS OF THE NEW STATE 

From a huge empire Turkey has shrunk to a small state. The 
natural eastern boundary of Anatolia is formed by the Taurus and 
Anti-Taurus mountains (Fig. 213). The Black and Mediterranean 
seas limit it on the north and south. On the west it is terminated by 
the Smyrna district (now occupied by Greece) and by the Sea of 
Marmara. This gives Anatoha an area a httle larger than that of 
Cahfornia and a population of more than 8,000,000, of which only 
a small part is nomadic. 

The population of the new Turkey is broken up into self-con- 
tained, isolated groups, ignorant of the outside world, with primitive 
carts and plows, very poor roads, no modern towns, houses built of 
adobe (rarely of wood) . There are large areas of unoccupied country 
and extensive pasture lands. Brigandage is common. 

In 1915 Turkey passed a law which practically confiscated the prop- 
erties abandoned by people who had been exiled on account of her 
severe persecutions, and this law Turkey is required to void by the 
treaty of Sevres. She is also to facilitate the search for lost people 
(Armenians, Syrians, and others driven into the desert and mountain 
districts during the war) and the restoration of their property, though 
of course the internal administration of this measure will be exceed- 
ingly difficult, if not impossible. 

Turkish minorities are to receive protection at the hands of the 
Armenians, the Greeks, the British, etc., in the areas under their 
respective control, and on her part Turkey is to protect minorities 
within her new frontiers. The treaty requires Turkey to permit 
minorities to participate in the use of charitable and educational funds. 

Quite different from the Turkish peasantry of Anatolia are the Turk- 
ish rulers, who form an official caste. Also a class apart from the peas- 
ants are the Turkish nomads who have come into the Anatolian steppes 



Anatolia: Last Remnant of the Turkish Empire 443 

since the conquest. The differences between the three Turkish ele- 
ments — officials, peasants, nomads — extend to the fields of thought 
and social custom, and it will take time and experiment to demon- 
strate the capacity of the three elements to become welded into a 
single nation. 

The possession of Smyrna by Greece cuts off the Anatolian hinter- Best ports 
land from its natural outlets on the Mediterranean. Its commerce ^^ AnatoUa 

now m 

will flow through ahen hands — a distinct handicap. The new foreign 
Turkey will consist essentially of a mountain-rimmed plateau with ^° ^ 
a desert interior, though well-watered near the border, where it is 
capable of high development. If the new government will turn its 
attention to internal improvements rather than to external conquest 
and the rule of non-Turkish peoples in remote regions, Turkey may 
in time become a strong state. Otherwise it must become a liability, 
an expensive dependency of the great powers. 

Turkey was heavily laden with debt before 1914, and her system Turkey a 
of taxation was notoriously bad. As a result, her productive and ^dden 
commercial power had steadily declined. An aspect of her commer- country 
cial life suggestive in this connection is the pm-chasing power of the 
people ; in 1912 the imports averaged only $9 per capita, as compared 
with $40 for France and $127 for Belgium. 

It is to trade that Turkey must look for her chief sources of revenue, Necessitj 
and she is so poor that her commerce wiU long be required to sustain [^grclS" 
a very heavy burden of taxation. Her exports for a good many years growth 
to come must consist of special articles not produced in agricultural 
communities near by. Rumania and Russia can produce large quan- 
tities of grain much cheaper than Turkey, but Turkey is better suited 
for the production of dried fruits, tobacco, opium, and fine sk'ns. 
Turkey's undeveloped wealth will gain in importance because of for- 
eign need for new raw materials to feed the industries of the world. 
While half of Anatoha is desert, steppe, and mountain, there are 
locally fertile areas upon which silk, cotton, tobacco, fine wool, and 
subtropical fruits can be produced. Improved irrigation works will irrigation 
greatly increase the production and will make cotton growing pos- Possibilities 
sible even on the central plain of Konia, where now much of the 
land is desert, for lack of a proper apphcation of the available water 
supply. 



CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN 



THE MOUNTAIN HOME OF THE KURDS 

In the organized world of today there are but few groups of peo- 
ple that may lead a wholly isolated and unruly life. If a quarrel- 
some folk raid neighboring settled peoples, or interfere with the 
security of railways — as do the robber bands of Manchuria, for 
instance — foreign interference is bound to come. To other reasons 
why the Kurds of eastern Turkey will not be allowed to pursue their 
disorderly way without restraint, there is added the powerful reason 
that they are near vital British interests in Mesopotamia ; part of 
the completed Bagdad Une passes close to Kurdish territory. 

Are the Kurds a powerful people ? Has the war left them in control 
of their former territory.^ What will be their disposition in the 
settlement of the territorial problems involved in the partition of 
Turkey ? 

SETTLED AND NOMADIC POPULATIONS 

There are about 2,500,000 Kurds in Turkey, of whom the greater 
part live in eastern Asia Minor in the mountain region called Kurdis- 
tan (Fig. 216). They are related to the Persians in race and language, 
but most of them belong to a different Mohammedan sect (the 
Sunni). Because a part of their territory lies in Persia there is 
created a problem somewhat similar to that in Armenia where, be- 
fore the World War, the Armenian people were divided between 
two powers, Turkey and Russia. 

The Kurds are a semi-nomadic people, going up into the high 
vaUey pastures in summer to return in winter to the warmer valleys 
and lowlands. This seasonal migration brings them into conflict with 
the settled Armenians of the high valleys round about Van, Mosul, 
Kirkuk, Bitlis, and Kharput, and with the Persian villages of Ker- 
manshah, Isfahan, and Seistan. In some respects the Kurds co^e to 
the Mesopotamian and Armenian plains what the Afghans are to 
northern India or the nomadic Arabs to the oasis dwellers of Syria. 

The fiercer spirit and wilder mode of life of the Kurds have been 
the cause of their forcible settlement in many of the Armenian val- 
leys, where it was designed by the Turkish government that they should 
make a Mohammedan majority among the people. Downright law- 
lessness was practiced whenever it suited the Turkish government 
to make an occasion for it. The Kurd could always be counted upon 

444 



The Mountain Home of the Kurds 



445 




y-^.-A-'/^.yA-/,/^^y^('W'fim« „/ /.y ////,//.,. M 



Fig. 216. The home of the Kurds about the headwaters of the Tigris. Key to numbers: 
1, Turkish-speaking peoples; 2, Armenians; 3, Chaldeans; 4, Assyrians (Nestorians) ; 
5, Jacobites ; 6, Persians ; 7, Lurs ; 8, Arabs. The heavy dot-and-dash Hne is the old Turko- 
Persian boundary ; the dashed line is part of the temporary southern boundary of Turkey and 
Armenia; the heavy solid line divides Syria and Mesopotamia (page 103). Note the difficulties 
in establishing a state that embraces most of the Kurds. It would require revision of parts of 
two treaties (Sevres and the Franco-British agreement of 23 December 1920), and difficult 
negotiations with Armenia and Persia. From British General Staff, Map of Eastern Turkey in 
Asia, etc.. No. 2901, 1 : 2,000,000, 1910. 



to assist in the massacre of the non-Moslem populations, and in re- 
turn he received partial autonomy, having only to pay moderate 
taxes and to furnish auxiliary troops in time of war. 

To hold the Armenians in subjection at the time when they threat- 
ened revolt, to follow the policy of persecuting the Christians, and at 
the same time to content the Kurds, the Turks created a Kurdish 
cavalry, supplied it with uniforms and arms, and permitted it to raid 
Armenian and other Christian elements. 

At the present time the Kurds are more numerous and better armed 
than the Armenians and may create trouble for the new republic 
of Armenia. They have persecuted the Nestorian Christians of 



446 



The New World 




Fig. 217. Kurdish village in Upper Mesopotamia. 

Urmia as systematically and plundered them as regularly as they 
have the Armenians. 

The semi-nomadic tribes of southern Kurdistan are the most 
intelUgent and industrious of the Kurds. In winter they dwell in 
villages on the plains east of the Tigris ; in summer they migrate 
with their flocks to the Persian border, where they make temporary 
shelters or bowers of green wood. The wilder tribes farther north 
live principally in the rugged mountain districts near the Persian 
frontier ; some of them are settled on the land and have terraced 
and irrigated farms, others are nomadic. While the different Kurd- 
ish tribes vary in a minor way in their habits, all have two rather 
distinct types of settlements — those in the upper zone of pasture 
and those in the lower zone of valley farms. 

The Kurds were known to Marco Polo and yet earher travelers 
as "an evil generation whose delight it is to murder merchants." 
While the settled people tend to be hospitable, the treacherous 
nomads rob passing caravans. Some of the Kurd migrations from 
the mountains to the plains carry the nomads through villages of their 
own race, which they systematically plunder of everything that can 



The Mountain Home of the Kurds 



447 



be carried away, since they hold their sedentary kinsmen in contempt. 
In return the farmers, when they are strong enough, demand a toll 
of the nomad Kurd who wishes to cross their cultivated land or 
ford a stream whose passage they control. 

In addition the Kurds happen to live in mountain valleys which lie 
athwart both ancient and modern trade routes (Figs. 42 and 216). Yet 
travel among them is hardly safe. They control the mountain passes 
— the eastern Anatolian gateways — and exact heavy tolls from pass- 
ing caravans. Indeed, this is one of their chief sources of revenue. 

The difficulties confronting the administration of Kurdistan lie 
partly in the fact that the Kurdish tribes claim rights in Christian 
villages, due to the survival of an old arrangement which allowed the 
nomadic tribes to winter in any Armenian village. Something will 
have to be done with the tribes that have raided the Armenians, 
Nestorians, and sedentary Kurds. Self-government among the 
Kurds seems out of the question, owing to their deterioration under 
the Turkish regime, their habit of plundering, and their general in- 
ability to read and write, as well as their tribal mode of hfe. With 
the Turk eliminated, at least some groups of Kurds may choose to set- 
tle down and become peaceful neighbors, as they have done in certain 
places in Mesopotamia and Persia. As a result of invasions by both 
Russians and Turks during the war, some of the settled communities 
within the range of the Kurds have been extinguished and others 
reduced to a state of such poverty that it is no longer profitable to 




Traffic 
preyed on 
by the 
lawless 
Kurd 



The im- 
possibility 
of Kurd- 
ish self- 
government 



"SiQ. 218. Kurds and Arabs in typical costume. 



448 



The New World 



raid them. In spite of themselves, therefore, some of the Kurdish 
tribes akeady have had to give up their predatory habits and settle 
down to agricultural pursuits in order to live. 

Permanent settlement is also in line with their tendency during 
the past twenty years and with the policy of the Turkish govern- 
ment, which aimed to split up tribal organizations through fear 
that the Kurds might combine in large units to fight Turkish 
troops. But whether settled or nomadic, the Kurd has persisted 
in maintaining his tribal organization. Each tribe rules and owns 
the district in which it is settled, and is under the power of the tribal 
chief in case of war. The Kurds are devotedly attached to their 
sheikhs, who are responsible for occasional outbursts of fanaticism. 



TREATY ARRANGEMENTS AFFECTING KURDISTAN 

In the treaty of 1920 between Turkey and the Allied and Asso- 
ciated Powers, the provisions that apply to Kurdistan are as follows : 

(1) A commission composed of French, British, and Italian repre- 
sentatives is to frame an autonomous government for pre- 
dominantly Kurdish Eireas east of the Euphrates, south of 
the future boundary of Armenia and north of the Syria- 
Mesopotamia boundary, provided the Kurds shall some time 
in 1921 express to the League of Nations a desire to be inde- 
pendent of Turkey (Fig. 216). 

(2) The Kurds of the Mosul vilayet may voluntarily join the in- 
dependent Kurdish state. 

(3) Safeguards are to be provided for the Assyro-Chaldeans and 
other non-Kurdish populations. 

(4) A commission composed of British, French, Italian, Persian, 
and Kurdish representatives is to rectify the frontier between 
Kurdistan and Persia. 

By mid-October of 1919, the British had completed their pacifica- 
tion of a large section of Kurdistan. British troops visited many of 
the enemy villages as well as the valley frontiers dehmited by the 
armistice of November 1918, overcoming all opposition and estabhsh- 
ing temporary peace. British columns occupied the valleys of ofi'end- 
ing tribesmen and inflicted punishments for numerous hostile acts. 
British political officers with small detachments of troops occupied 
many of the widely scattered villages of Kurdistan, and were able 
to do this by arming local authorities and turning them into police 
to administer the country. 



The Mountain Home of the Kurds 449 

During 1920 there were risings among the Kurds as well as the 
Arabs of northern Mesopotamia and renewed fighting, with the result 
that the British forces were withdrawn over a wide area. Accused by 
opposition elements at home of extravagant plans for conquest, the 
British government was obliged to curtail its program of pacification. 
Having a mandatary for Mesopotamia, Great Britain naturally 
sought to control the headwater region of the Tigris and Euphrates 
upon which depends the water supply for the irrigation of Mesopo- 
tamia. 

The question of ultimate control of Kurdistan remains unsettled, 
nor can it be settled until the Turkish treaty is ratified and Turkish 
affairs are entirely reorganized. 



Weakness 
of the new 
states 



V^ CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT 

THE TRANSCAUCASIAN PEOPLES 

Transcaucasia is one of three narrow connections between East and 
West. The Suez Canal forms a second; the Bosporus and Darda- 
nelles sever Europe and Asia at the third. It is a fair inference that 
much history is made or is in the way of making wherever an isthmus 
connects two great populated land masses or a strait connects two 
great seas whose shores are peopled by settled folk and traders. The 
Transcaucasian land bridge is broadly divided into three parts : 
Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan (Fig. 220). It has been an historical 
battleground of rival interests. In its later phases, the struggle for 
possession has been between Russia and Turkey. At present the 
struggle is between three new repubhcs, no one of which has sufficient 
vitality to stand alone. In any event the three will be the pawns of 
their neighbors unless protected by one of the western powers. 



Internal 
rivalries 
of Trans- 
caucasia 



THE NEW GOVERNMENTS AND THE GREAT POWERS 

Shortly after the Russian revolution of March 1917, an autonomous 
government was organized in Transcaucasia. It took the form of a 
federal republic, the members of which — Georgia, Armenia, and 
Azerbaijan or the country of the Tatars — were governed by separate 
national councils. But the Federal Republic of Transcaucasia failed 
to harmonize the discordant aims of its three constituent members ; 
nor could it offer effective resistance to Turkish aggression in the spring 
of 1918. The Mohammedan Tatars could not be counted on to 
oppose the Turks and thus assist the Armenians; the Georgians 
were chiefly interested in their own national security, and even looked 
to Germany as a protector ; the Armenians would not join their two 
neighbors, because elements among them favored an understand- 
ing with Soviet Russia. Consequently the federal arrangement was 
discarded and Transcaucasia as a political organization fell apart. 

The former Turkish provinces of Kars, Ardahan, and Batum 
(Fig. 219), which had been taken by Russia in 1878, were renounced by 
the Soviet government under the Brest-Litovsk treaty of 3 March 
1918 and occupied by Turkey. Under Turkish auspices a plebiscite 
was held, resulting in a forced decision in favor of annexation by 
Turkey. Turkey acquired an additional strip of territory in Trans- 
caucasia by the separate treaties which she concluded with the three 

450 



Tlie Transcaucasian Peoples 



451 







French and 

British 

agreements 



Fig. 219. Successive advances of Russia in Transcaucasia. 



Transcaucasian repub- 
lics in May 1918. The 
extent of this second 
annexation was not 
precisely defined, and 
its validity disappeared 
with the final collapse 
of Turkish power in 
October 1918. 

In January 1919, 
France and Great Brit- 
ain appear to have 
agreed to divide south- 
ern Russia between 

them as spheres of influence. France was to have the western Ukraine, 
and Britain was to have the whole Caucasus and Kuban region. At 
the same time that the British occupied Transcaucasia, a French 
expedition was sent to Odessa to supervise Ukrainian affairs and direct 
military operations against the Bolshevists. But the expedition was 
withdrawn after the refusal of the Ukrainians to yield to the demands 
of the French leaders for complete military, economic, and political 
control. The failure of the French at Odessa dangerously weakened 
the British in Transcaucasia and ultimately led to a change of policy. 

The almost exclusive control of the unsettled Transcaucasian region withdrawal 
remained in the hands of the British only until July-August 1919, °^^"*'^'' 
when their troops were withdrawn from Armenia and Georgia, except 
for a few officers at each of the main towns and especially at the city 
of Batum. The withdrawal was due in smaU part to the charge 
made against Great Britain that she was seeking to gain control 
over additional territory rich in oil, and in larger part to the expense 
of maintaining alone, in so remote a region, costly mihtary forces 
and works — an expense that drew vigorous criticisms against the 
government in the House of Commons. 

For a time it appeared probable that Italy would succeed Great 
Britain in the military occupation of the region, since a certain amount 
of Italian capital is invested there, especially near Batum, and Italy 
is extremely poor in fuel. Moreover, Italy theretofore had not been 
assigned any important role in maintaining order in the disturbed 
sections of the Near East. 

The plan for Italian participation came to nothing, however, and 
after the British withdrawal (1919) almost no mihtary men were 



troops 



452 



The New World 




Fig. 220. Transcaucasia and the indeterminate boundaries of its three political divisions- The 
western boundary of Armenia is tentative ; it was agreed to leave the final settlement to Presi- 
dent Wilson. Many parts of the other boundaries represent merely paper agreements and have 
as yet no actuality in boundary posts and administrative control. 

Relief work left ill the region. A small force of officers and women assistants 

aft'erthe" attached to the Interallied relief organization went to Kars and 

withdrawal Erivan. No relief work was undertaken on the Turkish border and 

towards Azerbaijan, because the Kurds and the Tatars had taken 

possession of the region in the belief that the Armenians had been 

deserted by the Allies. 



Intermix- 
ture of 
races 



RACIAL DIFFERENCES AND THEIR POLITICAL RESULTS 

Transcaucasia has remnants of almost all the races which for ages 
past have crossed and recrossed its frontiers and sought refuge within 
its bounds. Five main groups are divided into forty odd subdivisions, 
of which from twenty to twenty-five are indigenous. 

It results that in starting their national life the three Transcau- 
casian states are confronted by extremely difficult boundary questions, 
because no one race inhabits a given region exclusively, all being 
intermingled throughout a wide zone. This is especially the case on 



The Transcauca'sian Peoples 



453 




THE CAUCASUS REGION 



Rough land 
Smooth " 
Snowfields 



Fig. 221. Note the small extent of smooth land in Georgia and Armenia and the isolated char- 
acter of the Armenian basins. The boundaries between rough and smooth lands are generalized 
from various relief maps. The outlines of the snowfields along the crest of the Caucasus Moun- 
tains follow Stieler's Hand-Atlas, 1916. 



the eastern frontier of Russian Armenia, where Armenians and Tatars 
are hopelessly mixed. In the Turkish treaty of 1920 it is provided 
that Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia are to agree mutually upon 
their frontiers. All of them are to have special privileges at the in- 
ternational port of Batum. 

The Georgians number 1,600,000, the Armenians about 1,000,000 Number 
(not counting refugees from Turkey), the Azerbaijan Tatars about JJ^^^^^gj. 
3,000,000. of the 

There is great diversity in the character of the people. In Georgia 
the inhabitants have a settled way of life, whereas the Tatars of the 
mountain region on the southeast live in a primitive fashion and 
depend chiefly upon herds and flocks, though they have control of 
the oil wells at Baku. In Georgia there is a small feudal aristocracy 
and a large farming peasantry. The northern mountain border of 
Georgia is inhabited by unruly mountaineers. 

The Tatars are Mohammedans, disposed to be friendly to Turkey, 



population 



454 



The New World 



Differ- 
ences and 
misunder- 
standings 



Argument 
for federa- 
tion under 
a single 
mandatary 



while the Georgians and Armenians are Christians and seek release 
from Turkish control. 

The Armenians of Transcaucasia, dwelling in a highland region 
broken by many valleys, are farmers and herdsmen. To their other 
causes of weakness are added their inland position and the penetra- 
tion of their villages and pastures by Kurds on the south and 
Tatars on the east. 

If allowed to perpetuate their quarrels, these three unlike peoples 
cannot do otherwise, in the unsettled state of the world, than fall 
into complete financial and political ruin. The religious differences 
accentuate the racial differences. Men go armed almost everywhere. 
Murder is conmion. Robber bands make travel dangerous. The 
Tatars and Kurds hate the Armenians and massacre them at every 
opportunity, being massacred themselves in turn. Such a region is 
peculiarly adapted for international intrigue unless held in control by 
a strong European power. 

It has been argued that though each Transcaucasian group might 
be kept distinct, the whole region should be placed under the League 
of Nations or a single mandatory power, because of the geographical 
position of the country at one of the crossroads of Eurasia. It is 
thought that if placed under separate mandataries, the three constit- 
uent peoples would intrigue against each other and quarrel endlessly 
over boundaries, customs, the migrations of nomadic villagers, water 
rights, irrigation privileges, mines, and all the other conditions and 
resources whose development is necessary if the lot of the people is to 
be bettered and orderly governments are to be maintained. Some sort 
of outside supervision seems absolutely essential to peace. 



Trans- 
caucasia 
backward 
but rich in 
resources 



INTERNAL ECONOMIC CONDITION 

The problems of Transcaucasia at the present time are chiefly : 

(1) To maintain order. 

(2) To develop the country's resources. 

(3) To build wagon roads and railways. 

(4) To develop an organized community life under the protec- 
tion of one or more of the great powers. 

The three nations occupying Transcaucasia are young, inexpe- 
rienced, and in the main disorderly and poor. The leaders are corrupt 
and incompetent. The government of Georgia has nationalized the « 
land without compensation to the original owners, and for a time flew J 
the red flag of Bolshevism above the Georgian national flag. Only 



The Transcaucasian Peoples 455 

with the help of British troops of occupation was order established 
and railway and telegraph service improved, at least for a time. The 
people of Azerbaijan are ignorant, lazy, and superstitious, occupying 
a country shut off from the western world. But within its frontiers 
there are rich oil deposits, centering at Baku, and a pipe line con- 
veys the crude petroleum to Batum on the Black Sea coast of 
Georgia. The hfe of Azerbaijan can be stabilized only if political 
and general education go hand in hand with economic development. 

Russian Armenia (as distinct from Turkish Armenia) is in a worse pught of 
condition than either Georgia or Azerbaijan. For several winters its ^"fsian 

1 1 1 1 «*'. T,/ri Ti/. and Turkish 

people have been on the verge oi starvation. Many have died oi Armenia 
famine and of the diseases that come in its train. Such roads as it 
had are falling into ruin. There is stagnation of business, with ris- 
ing freight rates, increased poverty, and community wars at every 
turn. Finally, the country has been invaded by Russian Soviet 
forces and a Bolshevist government set up. 

The condition of Turkish Armenia is even worse. Only a remnant 
of the area formerly occupied by Armenians can be put under Ar- 
menian administration. Half the Armenians in Turkey were killed 
or died of disease or starvation. Less than a milhon are scattered 
through a district that once held two or three times that number. 
And few Armenians hving abroad will care to return to a land where 
life offers primitive and even dangerous conditions. 

LOCAL TREATIES 

Pending the final settlement of the affairs of the three countries Agreement 
of Transcaucasia, provisional settlements were arranged; but the I*^^®^ 
general insecurity of the region and the political and social in- memansof 
stability of the world give Httle hope that these local settlements will and^the^ 
bring peace. The Armenians of Karabagh made an agreement with Tatars 
the Republic of Azerbaijan whereby both Armenians and Tatars 
were to be represented in the civil administration of the district : this 
is because the populations are so thoroughly intermingled that it is 
impossible to draw a dividing line between them. 

The Republic of Georgia and the Republic of Azerbaijan likewise Treaty 
concluded a treaty, whose main provisions are as follows : Oeorda 

cLiid Azcr~ 

(1) Neither side can start a war with an outside government with- baijan 
out previous agreement with the other. 

(2) Each state agrees to join its neighbor in case a war is brought 
on by another state. 



456 



The New World 



The 

Georgian 

Republic 



(3) The treaty is to last three years. 

(4) The two states mutually agree to safeguard each other's in- 
dependence. 

The provisions of such treaties between politically unstable peoples 
have little significance beyond indicating the aspirations of the moment. 
Out of the wreck of successive agreements something is always salvaged 
that comes at last to be incorporated in the permanent treaties of stable 
governmentSo 

SPECIAL FEATURES OF GEORGIA 

Georgia declared itself an independent republic in 1918. Govern- 
ment is by an elected national council, or assembly, with a responsible 
ministry. The new state at first accepted German protection and 
Germany sent troops to Tiflis and probably restrained the Turks from 
occupying Georgia. By the Russo-German treaty of 27 August 1918 
(supplementary to the treaty of Brest-Litovsk), Russia acquiesced 
in Germany's right to recognize the independence of Georgia. In 
1920 Georgia concluded a treaty with Soviet Russia in which the 







Fig. 222. Tiflis, capital and chief city of the Republic of Georgia. 



I 



The Transcaucasian Peoples 



isif 




Fig. 223. 



Brown Bros. 
The harbor of Datum, principal port of Transcaucasia on the Black Sea. 



independence of Georgia was recognized within the following territory : 
the provinces of Tiflis, Kutais, and Batum, the districts of Zakataly 
and Sukhum, and a part of the Black Sea government. But the 
military conditions imposed gave the Bolshevists practical control of 
the repubhc. The treaty has theoretical force only so long as the 
Soviet government exists, and no practical force whatever so long as 
organized military forces under anti-Bolshevist leaders control the 
Kuban and the Don country. 

The Georgian Republic has an area of 35,000 square miles and a 
population of 2,000,000. The region is well located as a thoroughfare 
for the trade that flows westward from territory east of the Caspian 
Sea and from Persia, whence a railway runs north across Armenia to join 
the Georgian system. It has some oil fields and copper deposits. 
It has also the greatest manganese deposits in the world, which were 
the source of 44 per cent of the world's supply in 1913 ; in 1918 and 
1919 production had dropped practically to nothing. It has fertile 
valley lands and an excellent climate for cereals and subtropical prod- 
ucts, Hke tobacco, cotton, dried fruits, raw silk, etc. The borders of the 
Armenian highland on the south and the snow-capped Caucasus on 
the north form excellent natural frontiers. Within this territory the 
population is three fourths Georgian. 



458 



The New World 



People of 
Armenia 




DIFFICULTY OF THE AR- 
MENIAN MANDATARY 

Armenia proclaimed 
its independence early 
in 1918 at Garine, a 
place located in the cen- 
ter of the high plateau 

Fig. 224. The broken lines represent Armenia's claim; the 

heavy solid line enclosing the stippled area, maximum limits of OI the nCW TCpubhc are 

Armenia as now established by custom in Transcaucasia and i tt" oCiA 

by treaty (S^\Tes, 1920) between the Allied powers and Turkey. SnOWn On T Igm^C ZZ^, 

It was arranged that the final boundary on the west should but within thcSC frOH- 
be based on the recommendation of President Wilson. 

tiers only a small part 
of the people are Armenian; the rest are principally Km^ds, Turks, 
and Syrians. With these facts in mind, the leaders of the AlUed 
powers required Turkey to relinquish sovereignty over but four vila- 
yets — Van, Bitlis, Erzerum, and Trebizond (Fig. 225) — with an 
area of 75,000 square miles, 50 per cent more than that of the state 
of New York. The Armenian population has been so much reduced 
that probably only 300,000 at the most live in these four districts. 
Turkey, Armenia, and the Allied powers have mutually agreed to 
leave the exact location of the Armenian-Turkish frontier -on the 
south and southwest to the recommendation^ of President Wilson. 
While the decisions of the Turkish treaty of 1920 (treaty of Sevres) 
cut Armenia off from access to the sea at the Gulf of Alexandretta, 
there is provided an outlet at Trebizond. In addition, Armenia will 
have an outlet at Batum, which may become a free international 
port with outlet facilities on terms of equality to all the Trans- 
caucasian peoples. In Transcaucasia, Armenia claims about 25,000 
square miles of territory; but the number of people in the region 
can hardly be estimated, even, owing to the losses by war and star- 
vation and the flight thither of refugees from Turkish Armenia. 
Before the war it had a total population of all elements of about 
2,000,000, of which half were Armenians. It is an agricultural coun- 
try with a small urban population. The principal towns are Kars 
and Erivan. There are extensive alpine meadows, but no forests. 
A few rich irrigated valleys, a type of which is Aras, export fruit and 
wine. Erivan produces cotton and Karabagh exports raw silk. 

The Armenian nation had an independent existence in the past, 
but lost this position when the Turk extended his rule over Asia 

^ Submitted near the close of the Wilson administration but not yet announced by the 
Allied powers, owing to chaotic poUtical conditions. 



The Transcaucasian Peoples 



459 



memans 

and 

Syrians 



Minor in the 13th and 14th centuries. Thereafter the Armenians Deporta- 
were persistently persecuted. For example, in 1894-1895 the Mos- ^^^^^^and 
lem Turks attacked the Christian Armenians and put to death from of the at- 
100,000 to 200,000 of them. These atrocities were repeated in 1909, 
in the Adana region especially. 

Taking advantage of the World War, the Turks " deported " thou- 
sands of Armenians and Syrians, young and old; that is, the "exiles" 
were driven into the wilder parts of the mountains and the Syrian 
desert and left to die. Only to mention a directly calculable result, 
more than 800,000 Armenians were assassinated, burned alive, or 
starved by the Turks between 1914 and 1918. The Christian nations 
of the West, therefore, sought not only to end the rule of the Turk 
in Europe (except for nominal sovereignty over a mere patch of land 
northwest of Constantinople), but also to free his subject peoples at 
Smyrna and in Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and the Armenian 
districts bordering Russia. 

Americans have long had great interest in the missionary schools 
and colleges, the hospitals, and the social development of Turkey. 




Fig. 225. Ethnography and boundaries in the Armenian country. All boundaries are provi- 
sional, including the one with Persia (page 448). The western boundary as shown here repre- 
sents the units of the four Turkish vilayets renounced by Turkey. A more detailed boundary' was 
recommended by President Wilson. Key to numerals : 1, Turkish-speaking peoples; 2, Kurds; 
3, Greeks; 4, Assyrians (Nestorians) ; 5, Chaldeans; 6, Jacobites; 7, Persians; 8, Arabs. 



460 



The New World 



Annemans 
a minority 
in the 
historically 
Armenian 
area 



Depend- 
ence upon 
Allied 
support 



There is a missionary college at Beirut in Syria, one at Kharput in 
Armenia, and one at Constantinople. On this account the European 
powers were unanimous in desiring America as the mandatary of Ar- 
menia ; but it is unlikely that the United States wiQ accept so remote 
and costly an obligation, in view of the acute problems nearer home^ 
especially in the Caribbean and the Phihppines. 

Though the massacres, historical and recent, have left but a fraction 
of the race, in modern times Armenians never have formed more than 
a minority in any large administrative district. There could not 
be established a new Armenia similar to the Armenia of a given period 
of the past, without putting into it populations of different race and 
speech, far more numerous than the Armenians themselves — a case 
similar to that of the Jews of Palestine. 

The Armenians could not police or develop the whole region that 
some of their leaders claim. At least, they could do so only with loans 
from the Allies and with the support of Allied officials and possibly 
AUied troops. These forms of assistance would be expensive and 
cannot be lent at this time. Moreover, such a plan would be a great 
encouragement to other minorities to seek Allied aid in holding coun- 
try for the maintenance of which they have neither the moral nor the 
financial strength. Such a proceeding would create nations of artificial 
character without real stability. These are practical considerations 
which must be faced as squarely as the sentimental considerations 
that spring from a desire to achieve historical justice. 



AZERBAIJAN — A TATAR BOLSHEVIST REPUBLIC 

The Azerbaijan Tatars are of totally different race and speech 
from either Armenians or Georgians. Part of them live just across 
the frontier of Persia (Fig. 220). They number about 3,000,000 in 
Russia, and hve in an area of 40,000 square miles. 

The Tatars of Transcaucasia, after establishing the Azerbaijan Tatar 
Republic, with a national assembly and council of ministers, altered the 
form of the government, which is now similar to that of Bolshevist 
Russia. The republic is reported to include the former governments of 
Baku and Elisavetpol, and to be aiming at union with Persian Azer- 
baijan and Daghestan, a province of Russia north of the Caucasus. 

Baku, with its valuable oil wells, fell under Bolshevist control at 
first ; but subsequently a more moderate government, friendly to the 
Allies, seized power, and a British expeditionary force occupied the 
city late in 1918. When the British force was withdrawn, the city 



The Transcaucasian Peoples 461 

was captured by the Turko-Tatars and annexed to the Azerbaijan 
Tatar RepubHc. 

In May and June 1920, Bolshevist forces invaded Azerbaijan, 
captured the British war vessels at Enzeli on the southern coast of 
the Caspian Sea, and invaded Persian territory. This campaign was 
carried out in spite of a prior agreement with Persia to abrogate the 
understandings of the Czar's government respecting concessions 
and a sphere of influence in Persia. Embarrassed in the west by Polish 
resistance and on the south by Ukrainian forces under Wrangel and 
others, the Bolshevist leaders curtailed their Transcaucasian program 
and withdrew from Persia. 

CONCLUSION 

The poUtical situation in the Transcaucasian region is thoroughly 
confused and will remain so until the larger forces are resolved 
which affect these weak and poor communities. The Armenians 
sought peace with Turkey only to be presented with impossible terms. 
A Bolshevist invasion followed, and an unrepresentative Soviet- 
Armenian government was established. Georgia was next attacked 
and its capital, Tiflis, besieged, but it had neither the strength nor the 
unity and experience to withstand the Bolshevist forces without and 
within. Azerbaijan has ofl'ered no real resistance to Bolshevist con- 
trol. Under these circumstances there can be no independence and 
reorganization until there has been established a definite policy toward 
the Bolshevist government of Russia by the western powers. Should 
no such policy be forthcoming, Russian Soviet control is designed to 
extend to its old frontiers in Transcaucasia ; for it was not so much 
against the Transcaucasian governments themselves as against 
Turkey that the Bolshevist attack was aimed as an answer to the 
effort of the Turkish Nationalists to exterminate Armenia and expand 
to the Georgian frontier. It is a mark of the ever-changing character 
of the politics of the Near East that the Nationalists of Turkey and 
the Bolshevists of Russia should have followed this difference with 
a reconcilement and even a treaty. By May 1921 military supplies 
were shipped in some quantity from southern Russia to Turkey. 



CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE 

PERSIA IN RELATION TO BRITISH INTERESTS 

Each of the ancient nations of Europe and Asia was in its time a 
center from which there radiated a host of civihzing influences. The 
Roman and Greek civiUzations are the better known because of their 
miUtary exploits and their high culture, with its profound influence 
on western civihzation. A more remote but appreciable influence has 
been exerted by the civihzations of the "transit" lands of the Near 
East. Persia, the outpost on the east, has always been of interest to 
the western world. In the middle of the 6th century b. c, Cyrus 
created a powerful empire stretching from the ^gean to the Oxus and 
the Indus. The brilliant recrudescence under the Sassanian kings 
(3d to 7th centuries a. d.) shared the common fate of the transit lands, 
Arab conquest being foUowed by Turkish and Mongol invasions. 
The Iranian oases lie open to the steppes and deserts of Central Asia. 
As Omar Khayyam depicted the sophisticated civihzation of the oasis, 
so the great epic poet Firdousi immortalized the struggle between the 
sedentary Iranian population and the nomad Turanians and Tatars. 
The situation has not lost its significance today ; Persia remains a 
transit land on the road to the east, open on the north to the power 
that controls the steppe. 




Fig. 226. One of the gates of Teheran, the capital of Persia. 
462 



Persia in Relation to British Interests 



463 




Fig. 227. Persia's present boundaries are shown by a heavy line. Additional territory which 
was part of the Persian Empire at the time of its greatest extent (500 B.C.) is shown by stippling; 
according to Shepherd, Atlas of Ancient History, 1913, PI. 8. 



LAND AND PEOPLE 

Only in the central and eastern parts of Persia, between the Cas- Persian 
pian Sea and the Persian Gulf and eastward to the Afghan frontier, ™°jj"dMert 
does there survive a considerable block of population of rather pure people hard 
Persian type, who still speak the Persian language. In the west (the ° govern 
provinces of Tabriz, Kermanshah, and Khuzistan) the population 
includes Kurds, Armenians, and Arabs, rebelhous in temper, remote 
from authority, Uving in broken country difficult to conquer or to poUce. 
In the northeastern part of Persia the people are Turkish in origin 
and speech ; for example, Turkomans from Russian Turkestan. Along 
the shores of the Persian Gulf there are Arab and negroid elements. 
These ethnic variations are due to Tatar, Arab, and Turkish conquests, 
which were carried out frequently between the 10th and 18th centuries. 

Persia is one fifth as large as the United States, and consists of Persian 
country about as extensive and twice as populous as that portion Sure* of 
of the American West between the Rockies and the Pacific, south of races 
Idaho and Oregon. All told, the population numbers less than 
10,000,000 (Fig. 228). A large part of the country is mountainous 
and desert, difficult to cross, and almost without inhabitants. The 
population is distributed in widely scattered irrigated spots; each 
part tends to five to itself, and there is no national cohesion. To gov- 
ern so large and varied a country under primitive conditions of travel, 
away from the few railways and automobile roads that rmi between 



464 



The Neio World 





U S s r^A 

oAskabad , -.^ 



bad 






oKmnan 




D.uidai \l)bi^^^\:^ ^..^-•' '^\ 




Fig. 228. Persia is made up in part of almost uninhabited desert (southeast) and in part of 
densely inhabited irrigated valley lands (northwest). In modern times it has not been 
able to develop its own resources, lacking capital and initiative ; and its rich stores of petroleum 
have brought rival powers (Russia and Great Britain) into the field of domestic as well as inter- 
national politics. Modified from Philips, Comparative Wall Map of Asia, 1 : 12,000,000, 1912. 

the chief towns, would be a big task for a strong central government. 
The Mohammedan elements in the country do not want this kind of 
government ; they thrive on graft and disorder. Even if left to itself, 
the decent element would find it exceedingly difficult to put down 
brigandage and make life, property, and travel safe. 

PERSIAN AZERBAIJAN 

We have seen that Persia's border people have always given trouble 
to the central government. One of these border elements is Persian 
Azerbaijan, a region peopled by Tatars related by ties of rehgion 
and language to the Tatars of Russian Transcaucasia, just across the 



I 



Persia in Relation to British Interests 465 

international boundary line. The disposal of Russian Azerbaijan is 
still in doubt. If it should not become independent, it would be 
natural for Persia to get it, because part of it was formerly Persian, 
being ceded to Russia by treaties in 1813 and 1828. It should not 
be turned over to Persia unless the natives desire it, however, and 
even then only if Persia gives conspicuous evidence of a capacity for 
orderly self-government. 

If the Persian and the Russian portions of Azerbaijan remain sepa- 
rate as before, Russian Azerbaijan will be a field of intrigue for Bol- 
shevist influence within the Persian border so long as the present 
Russian government continues. 

A FIELD OF FOREIGN RIVALRY 

In addition to her internal difficulties, Persia has had to face European 
the interference of three European powers, especially in the past i^terfer- 
twenty-five years. Russia and England have both tried to push Persia 
their control of Persian affairs to the greatest lengths. Just before 
the World War and also during the early stages of it, Germany was 
courting the Persians and corrupting them, hoping to have thek aid 
when German and Turkish armies should march through Persia to 
begin their conquest of India. 

Railways have been the focus of Russian and British rivalry, important 
Russia has wished to secure a trans-Caucasus line to the head of the ^'fi^ways 
Persian Gulf (Fig. 230), as one of her possible warm water outlets, some day 
Great Britain, on the other hand, has been quite as eager to complete s[a^^ 
a railway to India across southern Persia and Baluchistan. In addi- 
tion to this, British statesmen have always kept a very jealous eye on 
aU incursions by foreign powers into the Near Eastern realm whereby 
Britain's road to India might be threatened in even the slightest 
degree. 

The chief differences between Russia and England were settled For Russia 
in 1907 by an agreement which gave Russia a sphere of influence in no^hem 
northern Persia that was more than 300,000 square miles in area, and for 

• Great 

It extended from Afghanistan to Kurdistan and included the capital, Britain 
Teheran. The British sphere included southern Persia on the borders ^ southern 

^ ^ sphere of 

of Baluchistan, an area scarcely half as large as that assigned influence 
to Russia. The British thus got control over the outlet of the Per- 
sian Gulf, which would enable their navy to prevent the landing or 
the embarkation of an enemy expeditionary force at the head of the 
gulf. It was intended to leave central Persia either independent or 
neutral ground; but it was inevitable that Russian and British 



466 



The New World 



i^ CI 



i,>tm/^ 









Fig. 229. General landscape view in the vicinity o; i^ueran, Persia. 



Great 
Britain's 
interests 
both 

poUtical and 
com- 
mercial 



interests should extend their sway farther into the interior until 
they controlled the whole country. 

With Russia diverted by civil disorder, her influence is for the 
moment withdrawn from Persia, while that of Great Britain has 
become more powerful. The Bolshevists have denoimced the 1907 
Anglo-Russian agreement as being unjust to Persia. In addition, 
the present Russian government has informed Persia that it is ready 
to surrender aU the concessions in Persia obtained under the regime 
of the Czar and to forego interference in Persian affairs, though the 
value of this promise by the Bolshevists can amount to httle in view 
of their oft-expressed contempt for treaties, even those bearing their 
own signatures. On its side the British govermnent steadily with- 
stood the Persian request for recognition by the Peace Conference of 
Paris and for a status of independence and self-government, free from 
foreign control. 



BRITISH OIL INTERESTS 

Great Britain's desire to guide Persian affairs is due not only to one 
of the lessons of the war — that British India in time of general disturb- 
ance has some very rebelUous elements (there are more than 66,000,000 
Mohammedans in India) — but also to the British poHcy of securing 
as great a share as possible of the world's oil supply. That this is 
not the pohcy of British commercial interests alone is shown by the 



Persia in Relation to British Interests 



467 




Fig. 230. British progress in Persia. The former Russian sphere has no basis in reality on 
account of the present disordered state of Russian political life ; the former British sphere is for 
practical purposes replaced by the concession of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, Ltd. (in which 
the British government owns a controlling interest), and by the terms of the Anglo-Persian treaty 
of 1919. Based on data in Redwood, A Treatise on Petroleum, Vol. I, 1913; Schweer, Die Hir- 
kischpcrsischen Eradlvorkommen, 1919; Morgan, Mission Scienfifique enPcrsie, 1895; Stahl, Hand- 
buck der regionalen Geologie, 1907; Geographische Zeitschrift, Vol. XXI, 1915, pp. 483-499; Geo- 
graphical Journal, Vol. IX, 1897, pp. 528-532; Stieler's Hand-Atlas ; and other sources. 



fact that the British government itself is the chief stockholder in one 
of the great Persian oil fields. One of the largest operators is the 
Anglo-Persian Oil Company, Ltd., which was formed in 1909 and in 
which the British government purchased control in 1914, increasing 
its holding in 1917 to $25,000,000, with enormous annual profits. 
British government investment in Persian oil cannot fail to influence 
British policy in Persia, quite apart from the position of that country 
as a bufi'er state. All British imports for development, as well as ex- 



468 



The New World 



Great oil 
resources 
of Persia 



British de- 
pendence 
upon fuel 
oil 



ports, are tax-free. The oil concession covers nearly 500,000 square 
miles, or more than three fourths of the area of all Persia, and with it 
go guarantees of poUce protection by the Persian government and the 
privilege of purchasing cultivated land belonging to the state. For 
her rights, Persia was to obtain 16 per cent of the annual net profits ; 
but the company has withheld this profit and thereby has caused very 
bitter feeling in Persia. 

Oil is probably the chief undeveloped asset of Persia for which there 
is a keen demand. The oil fields of Persia alone would make her 
important in international affairs; she is comparable in this respect 
with Mexico, in whose oil lands a large amount of foreign capital is 
invested under constitutional guarantees that have been broken or 
set aside. Persian oil is at present coming from Maidan-i-Naphtun, 
about two hundred miles north-northeast of the head of the Persian 
Gulf. Thence it flows through a ten-inch pipe line to Abadan on the 
Shatt-el-Arab, the common outlet of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers at 
the head of the Persian Gulf. There are many other locahties where 
oil may be obtained, but development awaits stable political conditions. 

England's interest in Persian oil is due not only to the general concern 
for fuel which all industrial nations feel, but also to the dependence of 
her commercial fleet upon the protection of the navy. The use of oil 
as fuel is especially favored for battleships, because it is economical 
in space and labor. The growth of great ofl companies that control 
the world's output of oil might some day make the price excessive to 
the British government and thus have grave political consequences 
that would threaten her national security. The fact that the oil from 
the Persian fields wiU also enable the Indian goverimient to substitute 
oil for coal on the Western Indian Railways increases Great Britain's 
interest in maintaining her hold on Persia. 

One of the problems of the future is to make the British adminis- 
tration in Persia square with Persian right to independence. If the 
oil merchant controls Persian afi'airs, the future state of the country 
will be no better than the past. And it goes without saying that the 
people of Persia must themselves benefit by the use of the ofl. It is 
a part of their natural inheritance which should riot be taken by either 
force or intrigue. They are entitled to a fair share of the profits, and 
this has been denied them in the past. 

ANGLO-PERSIAN TREATY PROVISIONS 

On 9 August 1919, Great Britain and Persia signed the Anglo. 
Persian treaty, which has as its chief provisions : 



I 



I 



Persia in Relation to British Interests 469 

(1) Great Britain respects the independence of Persia. (This is, 
however, a purely nominal independence in view of the provi- 
sions that follow.) 

(2) The British government will supply expert advisers to the 
Persian government at the latter's expense. (Naturally Persia 
will be pressed to follow their advice whether she wishes to or 
not.) 

(3) The British government will supply the Persian government 
with officers, munitions, and modern military equipment for 
a military force designed to preserve order in the country and 
on its frontiers. (And thus secure order on the frontiers of 
British India.) 

(4) The British government will make a loan to Persia which will 
be guaranteed by the revenues from customs or other sources. 

(5) Great Britain will build railroads and other means of trans- 
port to extend trade and prevent famine. (With British capital 
and to the profit of British investors as well as for the benefit of 
Persia.) 

(6) Persia and Great Britain agree to appoint a joint committee 
of experts to revise the existing customs tariff. 

As one of the Allies who have been consulted in the matter, the United 
United States will not give approval of the treaty of Great Britain poseTto^a 
with Persia until the people of Persia support it, for it was due to treaty not 

, t^ . /. sanctioned 

British influence that Persia was prevented from presenting her case by the 
at the Peace Conference of Paris. The influence of British interests Perda ° 
is seen in the fact that the treaty itself was negotiated in secret. 

ALTERNATIVE POLICY 

If the government of Persia could be given complete freedom from Need of a 
outside or foreign interference, there would undoubtedly foUow for go'^rrl^'^ 
a time a period of internal disorder. Were disorder confined to the °^^°* 
neutral central area where it would interfere least with investments 
held by foreigners, it would do the world no inomediate harm. It 
might even lead to the development of strong men who could at 
last set Persia free from reactionary and paralyzing Mohammedan 
influences, from her superstitions and indolences, and create an inde- 
pendent state, capable of managing its own affairs, of carrying out 
internal reforms in every branch of the government, and of restor- 
ing some of the glories of the past. 



CHAPTER THIRTY 

INNER ASIA: THE UNSETTLED LAND OF THE NOMAD 

In ihe vast interior of Asia are small groups of peoples of importance 
to the whole circle of countries roundabout them. Thus Tibet, 
long nominally a province of China, has recently become independent 
(under British protection) ; former Russian penetration of Inner and 
Outer Mongolia involved China in constant difficulties ; at intervals 
Afghanistan has threatened the peace of India and, more recently, 
of Persia : Turkestan has a variety of unstable Mohanomedan peoples. 



An arid 

continental 

interior 



Belted 
arrange- 
ment of 
soils and 
vegecdiion 



THE GEOGRAPHICAL ENVIRONMENT 1 

Inner Asia is in general a land of interior drainage, with mountain 
streams descending to the desert borders, where at greater or less 
distances from the base of the mountains they are lost in salt lakes 
or desert sands. Much of the region is whoUy uncultivable because 
of the aridity. Part of it is composed of sand and gravel desert, 
part is covered with heavy incrustations of ScJt, part consists of high, 
cold mountain country, and part of rich valley floors capable of 
irrigation. 

The sand and gravel deserts have very little vegetation, and are 
covered in part with shifting sand dunes called barkhans, as for example 
in the desert of Takla-Makan (in Eastern Turkestan). The sand 
deserts with the accompanying salt deposits and brackish lakes occupy 
portions of the central desert floors. The border of each basin is 
composed of graveUy waste deposited in a broad belt at the foot ofv 
the mountains, and supports a thin vegetation useful to the nomads 
in their wanderings from summer pastures in the mountains to winter 
pastures on the borders of the oases. Large tracts of Inner Asia, 
especially Mongolia and the northern part of Russian Turkestan, 
are covered with loam formed upon heavy deposits of wind-blown 
loess. Upon the loamy soil grass grows in relative abundance during 
the rainy season of spring, and suppHes pasture to the tent-dwelUng 
nomads that inhabit the region. »| 

Wliile each desert basin has its belts of soil and corresponding" 
belts of vegetation and of population, as in Eastern Turkestan, 
the whole of Inner Asia may be described as having its chief salt 
and sand districts in a broad belt extending from the Caspian Sea i 
eastward through Eastern Turkestan, Tibet, and western Mou- ] 
golia, and principally from the Aral Sea to Lop Nor (Fig. 232). 

470 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 471 




Fig. 231. Relief of Inner Asia. The cross-lined areas represent rough land, the unshaded areas 
smooth land, as generalized from the best atlases and other sources. The solid black areas repre- 
sent snowfields whose outlines are reduced from the topographic sheets of the India and Adja- 
cent Countries Series, 1 : 1,000,000, 1913-1916. 



It is north of this sandy belt that the grassy steppes occur in an 
equally broad zone extending from the Volga near Samara, eastward 
past the northern end of the Caspian, aU the way across Siberia to 
the Pacific. North of the steppe country is a vast belt of forest, 
which extends across Siberia from the Urals to the Bering Sea (Fig. 204). 

The movements of the nomadic people are controlled by the belted Nomadic 
arrangement of the vegetation and the differences in climate from ^°hT^°* 
place to place. Just as there is a movement from mountain to basin people 
floor in each separate basin with the approach of winter, so there is a 
general movement of the nomads from the grassy belt of southern 
Siberia southward to warmer winter pastures on the borders of the 
desert. The wanderings of the people are a response to geographic 
conditions that are here seen to be a more powerful influence than in 
almost any other primitive society of the Old World. 

In the earliest times, when civilization first arose and the cultivation Region of 
of cereals began (long before 8000 B.C.), the inhabitants of Inner H^l^^^^ 
Asia were fixed upon the land as agricultural peoples, or as hunters 
who had their homes in the oases. It may be presumed that later 
the hunters, growing in numbers, turned shepherds as animals were 
domesticated, and extended their wanderings farther and farther afield 



47^ 



The New World 




Fig. 232. To bring out the grazing lands more strongly the map has been constructed in a some- 
what unconventional way, the intermediate grade of rainfall being represented by the wliite, or 
unshaded, part of the map. Some of the land having over twelve inches of rainfall is grazing 
country, and some even of the driest territory has populous towns where irrigation is practiced, 
for example, Khiva. Based on Atlas of Asiatic Russia, 1914 (in Russian) ; Atlas climatologique 
dc V empire de Russie, 1900 ; and Bartholoinew, Atlas of Meteorology, 1899. 



Basis of 
the Mon- 
gol con- 
quests 



in search of fresh pastures for their increasing herds. There was thus 
produced a tendency toward a division of the population, so that 
throughout the historical period the Iranian (that is, Persian) popu- 
lation of western central Asia and the Persian plateau remained settled 
in towns and tilled fields, while the Mongol stock of the region toward 
the east took to nomadism to a steadily increasing degree. 

The nomad is used to long journeys on swift and strong horses 
accustomed to desert climate and forage ; and as his tribal organiza- 
tion developed he was capable of ranging widely to raid settled lands, 
escaping without punishment. Here we have the basis of the success 
of the Mongol conquerors, who found ready-made an instrument 
of empire superior to any that could be opposed against them. Even 
today the wanderings of the nomads carry them over a great reach 
of country. Some of the Kirghiz in the eastern part of Russian 
Turkestan winter in the region of the Aral Sea and drive their flocks 
to summer pastures in the steppes of Omsk, eight hundred miles or 
more away to the north. 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 473 



THE WESTERN STEPPES OF THE KIRGHIZ REALM 

The northern portion of the steppe region of western Siberia is 
marked by fertile black soil ; the middle portion has a poorer brown 
soil ; and the southern portion is desert, or at least semi-arid. From 
time irmnemorial this has been the grazing ground of nomadic tent- 
dwelling peoples, the Kirghiz, wild and unruly horsemen of the steppe, 
whose main sources of wealth are horses, sheep, cattle, goats, and 
camels. The total population of the region is more than 5,000,000, 
of which only about 10 per cent is urban. (Note the region marked 
"Khirghiz Steppe," in Figure 232.) 

Since the middle of the 19th century this great steppe region has Nomadic 
been settled by Russian agricultural colonists, who have in large vad^by 
part displaced the nomadic hordes. The first active settlement was t^e rus- 
in the early 18th century, when Cossack posts were established. 
There followed a slow infiltration of Russian settlers, — peasants, 
voluntary religious exiles, and additional Cossacks (Fig. 203). 

Colonization and immigration on a large scale began in 1894 with 
the completion of the trans-Siberian railway in western Siberia. The 
manufacture of butter has become a great industry with the new 
colonists, and, like agriculture, would have developed much further 
if it were not for a wholly inadequate transportation system and a 
generally primitive organization of commercial facilities. Trade 
is carried on by fairs chiefly, of which every town of consequence has 
one each year. There is stUl a considerable caravan trade with Inner 
Asia. Wheat, rye, oats, and millet are the chief field crops. Copper 
is normally exported from the mines of the southern Urals, and fish 
from the Ural River. 

Politically the region is important because of the displacement Rivalry 
of the Kirghiz by the Russian colonists, who have penetrated in 5an*be- 
the north chiefly, because here they find a rich soil and greater accessi- *y®®^ ^"S" 
bility to the railroad. Thus the native nomads have been pushed Kirghiz 
farther south into the brown soil belt and the more arid steppe region, 
where hfe has become harder. The antagonism between the Russian 
settler and the nomad has been increased by an attempt made at the 
beginning of the World War, but later abandoned, to enforce com- 
pulsory military service among the steppe people. This was particu- 
larly obnoxious because the Kirghiz had by special royal charter long 
enjoyed freedom from such service. For refusing to give noncom- 
batant service behind the miUtary lines, thousands of them were 
killed by Russian troops in 1916. 



474 



The New World 



The Kirghiz are unwilUng to become sedentary under Russian 
pressure. The habit of roving is in their blood. "He feels it to be 
the greatest misfortune and liumihation when he must take to the 
plough, somewhere by a water course on the edge of the desert; 
and so long as the loss of all his herds has not hopelessly crushed him, 
he does not resign himself to that terrible fate which Mahomet has 
proscribed with the words : ' Wherever this implement has penetrated, 
it has always brought with it servitude and shame.' " 

There is a growing feeling of unity among the people that comes 
from the spread of Pan-Islamic ideas and the Pan-Turanian move- 
ment, the latter intended to organize politically the widely scattered 
peoples of Turanian stock. They are aU Mohammedans of Turkish- 
Mongol blood and of Turkish speech. 



Russian 
advance 
into cen- 
tral Asia 



RUSSIAN TURKESTAN 

It was in 1734 that Russia received the surrender of all the Kirghiz 
hordes ; but it was not until the military successes of General Peroffsky 
in 1848 had been achieved that the Khirghiz ceased to be an obstacle 
to Russian advance toward the east, particularly in Russian Turkestan. 
Then followed the fall of the khanates of Turkestan. By 1865 
Tashkent had been captured ; by 1868 Samarkand. In 1873 Khiva 
and the Amu Daria district were taken ; in 1875 Ferghana, Kokand, 
and Bokhara fell into Russian hands. There were still the Turkoman 







less than 2.5 1- - -I less than 
2.5 - IZ ^^1 - 5 
IZ - 50 ^^5 - 20 
50 - 100^^20 - 40 



6IS 



715 



I 



FiQ. 233. Popiilation densities of Russian Turkestan by districts. Figures refer to number of 
persons per square kilometer ; for approximate transforming factor to derive population densities 
per square mile, see legend. From Atlas of Asiatic Russia, 1914 (in Russian). 



Inner Asia: Tlie Unsettled Land of the Nomad 475 




6lS 






CZD 



Farm land 

Grazing . 

Waste » 










100 200 300 400 500 M 



_Ss_ 



Fig. 234. Land classification map of Russian Turkestan. After Atlas o/ Asiaiic Russia, 1914 

(in Rus.sian). 

robbers and slave dealers to reckon with, and after repeated efforts 
these were definitely conquered in 1884, when Russia stood at the 
Persian and Afghan frontiers, and the whole Turkestan region was 
rounded out. 

The territory of Russian Turkestan is an extension southward of physical 
the steppe region of the Kirghiz, and it also includes a desert tract features 
1200 miles from east to west which extends southward to the foot 
of the mountains that fringe the northern border of the great plateau 
of Iran. The desert portion is marked by irrigated bands of country 
along the northward flowing streams and by towns of both historic and 
recent importance — ^Merv, Khiva, Samarkand, etc.- — connected ANith 
the Caspian at Krasnovodsk by the trans-Caspian railway (Fig. 190). 
The region is hemmed in on the south and east by the mountains of 
central Asia, broken in two places by the Zungarian " gates" (Fig. 231), 
through which have passed practically all the ravaging hordes of Turks 
and Mongols that streamed into western Asia and eastern Europe. 

Russian Turkestan is a great lobe of the Russian Empire thrust 
southward into Inner Asia, and it has brought Russia a large crop 
of political troubles. The frontier of a great empire does not remain 
fixed for long; it is nearly always advancing. Each fresh advance 
tempts the empire-builders to go a step farther. As a result, Russia 
has pressed against China in Eastern Turkestan, has troubled and has 
been troubled by the Rritish in Afghanistan and Persia, and has 
encroached on Turkey along the frontiers of Transcaucasia . 



476 



TJw New World 



Peoples of 
Turkestan 



Nomad dis- 
like for 
govern- 
mental 
control 




Fig. 235. Ethnography of Russian Turkestan. "Fvom. Atlas of Asiatic Russia, 1914 (in Russian). 

The entire Turkestan region (Russian, or western, Turkestan ; 
and also Eastern, or Chinese, Turkestan) is peopled in the main by 
folk of Turko-Mongol origin — Kirghiz, Uzbeg, Sart, Turkoman, etc. 
Among these the Kirghiz are represented everywhere, forming in some 
places as high as 80 per cent of the whole. All are clannish to a degree, 
owing to their present and former wandering habit of Ufe ; and though 
their religion is Islam, to which they were converted in the 16th cen- 
tury, their attachment to the Koran is relatively feeble. The Turkish 
effort, during the World War, to stir up a feehng of racial sohdarity 
as part of the great Pan-Turanian scheme, was almost a complete 
failure among these peoples, in contrast to the favorable reception 
accorded the idea among the Kirghiz farther north and west. 

The Uzbegs of Russian Turkestan number about 2,000,000. They 
form 60 per cent of the population of Khiva and Samarkand and 
constitute about a third of Rokhara. Formerly nomadic, this group 
is now almost entirely settled on farms. They are of Mongol origin 
chiefly, and nearly all are Mohammedans. 

The people of Turkestan might become independent if they were 
not so diverse in racial character and if it were not for their strong 
antipathy toward governmental control, a characteristic of the nomad. 
On the south, whoever controls the cities will control the mountain 
peoples, who hve in part by trade with the cities. It seems impossible 
that the people of the region should be able to form an independent 
state without foreign assistance. 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 477 

EASTERN TURKESTAN — THE HEART OF INNER ASIA 

Eastern Turkestan extends 1200 niiles east and west, and 600 miles 
north and south. It is an uneven, mountain-bordered plain opening 
on the east toward Mongolia (Fig. 231). The higher parts of the 
province are snow-covered (above 15,000 feet), the lower are desert. 
Midway between is a belt of rough canyoned country, also virtually 
uninhabitable. The people hve chiefly in two belts of grassy vege- 
tation — the one on the mountain meadows just under the snow- 
fields, the other on the edge of the basin plain where there is a belt 
of rock waste, well suppHed on its desert edge with water from the 
mountain streams. The chief river is the Tarim. Kashgar, Yarkand, 
and Khotan on the west are the only cities of importance. 

This remote province of China has been the seat of important 
historic movements of population. Whether because of a periodic 
change of climate or because of the nomadic habit of life and the 
constant shifting of population which this entails, the people of 
Eastern Turkestan were pressed westward, and some of them even 
moved across Afghanistan and then into India as part of the Indo- 
Scythian invasion (in the 2d and 1st centuries B.C.). 

For almost twenty centuries, down to our own time, the control Farthest 
of the region shifted from Chinese to Turk, to Mongol, and back to cwnes*e 
Chinese. By the 1st century B.C., all Eastern Turkestan had passed control 
under Chinese "protection." Thereupon there was developed an 
important trade, but only feeble political control, and by the end of 
the 1st century a.d., the Chinese had practically withdrawn behind 
their Great Wall. Turkish control then came in, and lasted for more 
than five hundred years. 

Chinese control as well as cultural influence again extended into internip- 
Eastern Turkestan as far as Kashgar by the middle of the 7th cen- cHnese 
tury. Then Turk and Tibetan and Chinese struggled for owner- "^^® 
ship of these remote oasis peoples, untfl Genghiz Khan conquered 
the land in the 13 th century ; less than a century later came the con- 
quest by another great Mongol leader, Tamerlane. During the 15th 
and 16th centuries there was a long period of civil war which ended in 
1758 with the re-conquest of the whole region by the Chinese. Only 
for brief intervals was the province independent. Civil war followed, 
and the repeated invasion of the whole region by large Chinese armies. 
In 1862 a Mohammedan rebellion broke out in China, and taking 
advantage of it, this remote province massacred thousands of Chinese 
and ended Chinese rule until 1876, when the whole region once more 



478 



The New World 



Conflict ' 
between 
Russia 
and China 




Fig. 236. Faizabad bazaar, 

— and finally — fell into Chinese hands. In thus driving a wedge into 
central Asia and colonizing a far distant province, the Chinese were 
responding partly to motives of empire-building and trade, for across 
the region ran the great caravan route to western Asia. They were also 
in fear of the people who lived just beyond the Great Wall ; it was 
in this debatable ground that from the earliest times there had been 
fierce and continual struggles between the civilized and sedentary 
population of China and the nomadic barbarian hordes of Inner Asia. 

In the later development of her government in Eastern Turkestan 
in the past few decades, China has treated the region as a colony on 
the same footing with the eighteen provinces of China proper. Most 
of her difficulties hitherto have been due to the disturbed state of 
the Kokand region, east of Tashkent. Intrigues hatched in Kokand 
among a fanatical population constantly troubled the people of China 
on the western borders of Eastern Turkestan. To placate the IQian 
of Kokand, China formerly paid a yearly subsidy of about $15,000. 
These troubles ended with the absorption of Kokand by Russia in 
1876, and though there has been danger of Russian absorption of 
Kashgar since that time, there has been nominal peace for nearly 
fifty years. 

The oasis life of the people of Eastern Turkestan is easy and iso- 
lated, and it is in the oases that the population (Turki) chiefly live. 
Only 10 per cent are nomadic shepherds (Kirghiz), and there is a smafl 
group of fisher-folk (Lopliks) who live in the lakes and reed swamps 
of Lop Nor. Nearly all are Mohammedans. 



Inner Asia: Tlie Unsettled Land of the Nomad 479 




Chinese Turkestan, east of Kashgar. 

In spite of Mongol influences, the people of Eastern Turkestan Widely 
show little kinship to the Mongols. Instead they are more closely townrof 
related to the Iranian stock. Hence the anomaly of the weak Chinese *^® ^^^es 
holding a remote people of different culture and speech. A strong 
local government could not be formed, because the oases are widely 
scattered and are separated by difficult desert or mountain country. 
The towns and oases are from a hundred to two hundred miles apart. 
A population of only a little more than 1,000,000 is strung out over 
a belt of country two thousand miles long. It has been the prey of 
every invader. 

The largest trade is with Russian Turkestan, and there is some commodi- 
trade with India also, in spite of the hazards and difficulties of the long Jj^^^^ 
mountain roads and the cold high passes. Transport is by cart and 
caravan, the latter chiefly. Cotton, hemp, and tobacco are grown, 
besides grains and vegetables. Silk and cotton are among the chief 
exports and are produced in the warm oases at the lower elevations, 
but the list is headed by felts and rugs, products of the numerous 
flocks and herds of the pastures on the desert and mountain border. 
Jade and gold also are exported to China. 

The Republic of Turkestan in Russian Turkestan was proclaimed 
early in 1918, but the proclamation had httle effect in Eastern 
Turkestan. The Moslem Turks would like to get control of Eastern 
Turkestan as part of their Turanian realm. But the people take 
life so easily that they will never do much to help the Mohammedan 
or the Turkish cause. They will long remain as clay in the hands of 



480 



The New World 



Possible 

Bolshevist 

control 



The plun- 
dering 
Mongols 



Decline of 

military 

power 



the potter. Russia's interest in Eastern Turkestan has always been 
keen, since the rich western part of the province, which has all the 
large cities, lies on her frontier. Through trade and political agents, 
she has long sought control as part of her process of penetrating India 
on the one hand and the northern Chinese trade realm on the other. 
With the present disorganization of Russia, this pressure has ceased ; 
but it may begin again if the Soviet government attempts to extend 
its rule and its teachings into the densely populated and turbulent 
Indian peninsula. 

The region is of interest to China chiefly as a thoroughfare for 
trans- Asiatic commerce. If China fails to form a stable government, 
she may find this province allying itself with the western Asiatic 
forces to which it is more closely related by ties of blood, language, 
and religion. 

THE MONGOLIAN REALM 

From the earliest times, the wild and nomadic Mongols raided 
the adjacent fertile Chinese provinces. Their military and political 
power was consolidated in the 12th century, with the estabhshment of 
the "Empire of the Great Moguls." Under Genghiz Khan, in the 
early years of the 13th century, a well-drilled army was organized 
which penetrated the Great WaU and again and again ravaged and 
plundered the Chinese provinces. When Genghiz Khan turned his 
attention westward, he conquered most of Inner Asia, captured Tabriz 
and Tiflis, and with his Mongol armies swept westward as far as the 
site of Odessa. Farther north, Moscow was captured, then Nijni 
Novgorod ; Poland was ravaged as far as the Vistula, Hungary invaded, 
Budapest taken. Down to 1914 prayers were still said in some of 
the churches of Galicia for deliverance from the Mongols. 

No subsequent leader equalled the exploits of Genghiz Khan, and 
after periods of revival under Kublai Khan (late 13th century) and 
Tamerlane (14th century), the Mongol empire fell apart. The frag- 
ments are now divided among China, Russia, and Great Britain. 
The Mongols have fallen behind in the science of war. Their weapons 
were once the best in the world, their people had great endurance, 
and the nomadic life admirably suited them for wide conquests in the 
grass lands of eastern Europe and western and central Asia. Their 
arms are now obsolete, though if trained by the Chinese the Mongols 
might become once more an important military factor. 

Mongolia is today under Chinese rule. China has been compared 
to a sea into which aU waters flowing become salted. Thus she has 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 481 




Fig. 237. Hauling stores to Mongolia through Hannorbar, Chihli, fifteen miles north of Kalgan 
on the road to Urga. Typical mode of transport over large parts of Inner Asia. See also 
Figure 242. 



absorbed into her population or modified by her culture one after 
the other of the dynasties of barbarian origin that sprang from the 
region of Mongolia north and west of the Great Wall. 

Mongolia, as shown in Figure 252, is the largest region under Chi- Extent of 
nese sovereignty outside of the eighteen provinces of China. It has goL^"'^' 
nearly half the extent of the United States. It contains the great ''^g'o^ 
Gobi Desert, with an area of nearly a half-million square miles, ex- 
tending 1000 miles from east to west and from 450 to 600 miles from 
north to south. It has no permanent through-flowing streams, and 
is a region of great contrasts of temperature between summer and 
winter. 

The Gobi Desert is not everywhere a sandy waste. In the eastern 
part between K-weihwacheng, or Kalgan, and Urga the surface is flat 
and the ground is covered with thick, short grass that supplies excel- 
lent pasture. Though the region is capable of rapid and high devel- 
opment, there has been no marked advance in Chinese commerce for 
fifty years. 

The Mongohan realm is divided into Inner Mongolia and Outer cwnese 
Mongolia (Fig. 231). Inner Mongolia is populated by two classes, penetration 
the nomadic and the agricultural. In former times the Mongols 
invaded China, as noted above ; but in later years the Chinese have 
penetrated the region of the Mongols, where they become not only 



482 



The New World 



Caravan 
routes in 
Mongolia 



Trade be- 
tween 
Russia and 
Mongolia 



agricultural but pastoral people as well, and this with great success. 
Their penetration has been unusually active during the last twenty 
years. 

Since freight is always from twenty to forty times more expensive 
by land than by water, the cost of cart and caravan transportation 
across the vast plains of Mongolia is readily appreciated. We may 
also judge thereby the benefits which the building of railways would 
bring to the widely scattered towns that form the chief centers of 
trade. Owing to the poverty of the land, the population numbers 
only 2,000,000. The limited resources, the scattered and thin pas- 
tures, and the traditions of the people make nomachsm the rule. 
■ Large numbers of Chinese cart and pack animals come from Mongolia. 
It is estimated that 100,000 camels are used for the transport of tea 
from Kalgan in northern China to Siberia, and that the caravan trade 
employs 1,200,000 camels and 300,000 oxcarts. 

Mongolia is crossed by historic roads, important in both former 
and present commerce. Among the most important of the old roads 
is the one to Eastern Turkestan, the great Inner Asian trade route, the 
main coiijmunication between east and west. It has a total length 
from Peking to Kashgar of 3500 miles. For much of its distance the 
road, which passes through deep and narrow gullies, can be -used by 
a single line of traffic only. For hundreds of miles it winds through 
depopulated and untilled country. It crosses mountain passes 10,000 
feet high. Here and there are well-watered oases with an abundance 
of vegetation, and with prosperous but sleepy towns. The road is 
slippery in wet weather and deeply ravined. 

While the old caravan trade of China dates back beyond the Chris- 
tian era, the rich trade with China which Russia enjoyed is not more 
than two hundred years old. In 1689 a treaty was signed between 
China and Russia, granting to a Hmited number of Russian merchants 
the privilege of trading with China. Almost at once there was a Hvely 
traffic between the two countries. Silk and tea were carried across the 
Mongohan deserts and the Siberian steppes and mountains into 
European Russia. A small Russian settlement sprang up at Peking, 

For a time there was an interruption of this trade, owing to political 
differences between the two countries, which grew out of the asylum 
that was given in Siberia to a large band of Mongol robbers ; but in 
1725 a new agreement was reached in th^ treaty of Kiakta. By the 
terms of the treaty the frontier cities of Kiakta in Siberia and 
Maimachen just across the line in Mongolia became the gateway to 
Chinese trade. Warehouses and caravansaries were built, and a 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 483 




Fig. 238. The Great Wall at Naiikow Pass, China. This was the great defensive work built 
by the Chinese to keep out the people of Inner Asia and specifically the Mongols. From Clapp, 
the Geographical Review, 1920. 

great trade once more developed. All Russians had the right to 
trade with China. Cloth and hardware were brought from Russia 
and were exchanged for the silks, porcelains, tobacco, cotton, and tea 
of China. This trade continued until the building of the trans- 
Siberian raihoad, whereupon the camel commerce of the overland 
road rapidly declined. It is possible that a railroad will be built 
across the pass through Kiakta and the ancient trade revived in a new 
form. 

The strength of former Russian influence may be judged by the fact 
that in 1911 Russian agents induced certain Mongol princes to ask the 
Czar to take Mongolia under his protection. This was shortly after 
the outbreak of the Chinese Revolution, which threw China into a 
state of disorder that, with many changes, has continued down to the 
present (page 514). 



THE UNRULY STATE OF AFGHANISTAN 

In its later aspects Mohammedanism presents one of its most 
acute problems on the northwestern border of India, where, tucked 



484 



The New World 



Afghanis- 
tan as a 
center of 
Moham- 
medan 
fanaticism 



British 
policy in 
Afghanis- 
tan 



Afghan 
raids on 
the Indian 
border 



Order, the 
price that 
Afghanis- 
tan must 
pay for 
freedom 



away in the heart of Asia, is Afghanistan, a small country of unruly 
Mohanunedans. Though weak, it has hitherto stood between the 
two slowly growing empires of the British on the south and the Rus- 
sians on the north, and it has fought them both. 

The Afghan wars of 1839 and 1842 were followed by better rela- 
tions between England and Afghanistan, which culminated in the 
treaty of Peshawar in 1855. But even after this there was only a 
Hmited admission of British officers. Afghanistan wished to adhere 
to the policy of isolation. 

Thereafter the British policy was one of inactivity or at the most 
of petty meddling in the affairs of Afghanistan, until Russian suc- 
cesses in Turkestan (1875) forced England to frame a new policy in 
which Afghanistan was regarded not merely as a border country to India 
but as a possible avenue of Russian advance. The British had either 
to control Afghanistan or to endure the Afghan raids of the warlike 
and independent tribes bordering the Punjab in northern India. 

Afghanistan has been called "the land of rocks and stones and san- 
guinary feuds." Before the Afghan lies the region of northern India, 
which he has long coveted. He has frequently gone down and raided 
the plains and border valleys. He says in substance: "God in 
His goodness has placed these people nearby to be our lawful prey, 
that we may go down and reap their harvests when our own crops 
fail." 

It was in 1914, under the influence of a fanatical preacher, that the 
independence movement broke out in its wildest form on the north- 
western frontier of India. At one time the British had to employ 
250,000 Anglo-Indian troops to subdue the country. But for the 
refusal of the ruler of Afghanistan to join in a Holy War, the whole 
of northern India would have been aflame. At best, he could not 
prevent the wildest of his border tribes from giving the British oc- 
casional trouble. The latest disturbances on the northern Indian 
frontier began about the first of October 1919, when a band of 
Afghans some three hundred strong ambushed a British column. 
Rather heavy fighting on the Baluchistan and Afghanistan frontiers, 
involving principally the Wazirs, has been reported a number of times 
since then. 

Afghanistan can keep its independence only if it becomes more 
orderly. The right of a people to be independent depends upon 
ability to police its own frontiers, to prevent its land from becoming 
a base of operations for raids on the people of a peaceful neighbor, 
and to observe treaty obhgations. 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled. Land of the Nomad 485 




THE GEOGR. REVIEW, Aufe.l 



Scale 1:10000000 



fCara^uA f^ailroads: existing,' 



•i proposed, »- 



Fig. 239. Outline map showing in detail the proposed connections between the Russian and 
the Indian railway systems through Afghanistan. 

The question of the independence of disorderly peoples deserves a 
moment's further consideration, for to a marked degree it affects 
international policy in critical places. For example, in 1862 France 
got by treaty the right to support the independence of the Sultan of 
Maskat. This has enabled unscrupulous merchants to raise the 
French flag on Arab and Indian sailing vessels, and thus to get guns 
and ammunition into Afghanistan, by way of Djibouti (in French 
Somaliland) to Maskat and thence to the coast of Persian Balu- 



486 



The New World 



Evil ef- 
fects of il- 
legal trade 
in arms 
with un- 
ruly border 
peoples 



chistan, thereby furnishing the means of raising those perpetual 
border revolts against British rule that may some day lead to a Mo- 
hammedan rebellion in India. 

It was in the sanie way that a great deal of trouble was given the 
United States by shipments of German arms into Mexico when the 
United States was in armed dispute with that country in 1916. 
In the past English merchants have carried arms to Morocco for the 
Moors to use against the French and Spanish, and to Madagascar for 
the use of the Hovas against the French. Some of the small turbu- 
lent states would probably have been taken over long ago by the 
great powers if it were not, as all the world knows, that the powers 
are jealous of each other and hitherto have expected to profit by dis- 
order. A great deal of the turbulence is caused by merchants of 
these same big powers who find their trade in arms profitable in spite 
of all the risks of capture and confiscation. 



THE TIBETAN HIGHLAND 



The area of Tibet is a little less than 500,000 square miles, or nearly 
twice that of the state of Texas. It is a land of exceedingly lofty 
mountains and high desert tablelands and valleys. Some parts of 




Pig. 240. Outer wall of Kabul, capital of Afghanistan. 



Inner Asia: The Unsettled Land of the Nomad 487 




Fig. 241. Near the border between Afghanistan and Baluchistan. 



the region were not known until recently, one great section, including 
a mountain range theretofore unknown, having been explored by 
Sven Hedin as late as 1906-1908. Until recent years only Chinese 
representatives were permitted to enter Lhasa, the capital of the 
country. 

In aU there are about 2,000,000 Tibetans, living in semi-inde- 
pendent tribes, each with its religious leader, called a Lama. The 
chief rehgious ruler, called the Dalai Lama, has hitherto Hved at Lhasa 
in the royal monastery. 

In recent years British interests in Tibet have become more im- British 

interests 

portant because of the British government's desire to protect its in Tibet 
northern Indian frontier, to estabhsh trade relations between the 
people of India and Tibet, and to gain access to southern China by 
way of the more populous eastern and southeastern sections of Tibet. 
The Tibetans have always opposed pohtical and commercial penetra- 
tion on the part of Great Britain and China. Though agreeing in 
1893 to the estabhshment of a trade market at Yatung, situated in 
Tibet just outside the Sikkim frontier in northern India, the Tibetan 
government later authorized the tearing down of the boundary pillars 
between these two provinces, and the building of a wall across the way. 

Pearing that the continued hostility of the Tibetans was inspired British 
by Russia, Great Britain sent a military expedition into Tibet in expedition 
1903-1904, under command of General McDonald and Colonel Young- *° ^^^^^ 
husband. The latter entered Lhasa on 7 August 1904. The Dalai 



488 



The New World 



Activities 
of the 
Dalai Lama 



Conflict of 
Chinese and 
British 
interests 















^ J 














•-^ 














1 














4 














i 














1 














' ) 














,'.} 


19 




te 




^^^m% 


^ 


■A 

4 

: 


^-^•r-- 


Wiltm 


^ y^^M 


Br'^^ 


^tJumSsU X 


JPJf 






mmk 


fcj^J 




HHv^flB^ji^E^ 


\M;'' J 


K •' ' "^llK^Mflfe 


.'•:■; ./fil 


WgM 


il^^^l 






m 1 


HhIh 


i 




^Hfefehi^^'' V 


^FT*, JB\ 


IBf^Kb*^- alt- ^ 


il 


il 



JPiQ. 242. Camel transport in Inner Asia. Tibetans carrying merchandise, Shansi, China. 

Lama fled, but a treaty was signed with Tibetan representatives which 
opened three places in Tibet to Indian trade : Yatung, Gyangtse, 
and Gartok. Trade was to be free. This proposal was agreed to 
by China, Tibet then being nominally under her control, and in 1906 
she signed a treaty approving the Tibetan treaty and promised not 
to let any other power interfere in the affairs of Tibet. England, on 
her side, promised not to annex Tibet or interfere with her adminis- 
tration, and in 1907 confirmed this position by the Anglo-Russian 
treaty. 

When the Dalai Lama fled from Tibet in 1904, he first took refuge 
in Mongoha. From there he went to Peking, where he was told by 
the Chinese government that his land was really Chinese territory 
and that he must subject himself to the Chinese authorities. He 
was given an annual pension and sent back to Lhasa in 1909. Dis- 
orders occurring in his country just before and directly after his re- 
turn, the Chinese government sent a column of soldiers to Lhasa 
and the Dalai Lama fled to India in 1910. 

Then came the Chinese revolution in 1911 and the establishment 
of the Chinese Republic, In 1912, Mongolia and Tibet were de- 
clared to be integral parts of China. These activities of the Chinese 
government called for a protest from the British government, because 



Inner Asia: TJie Uyisettled Land of the Nomad 489 

of the fact that England had independent treaty relations with Tibet 
in wliich she did not recognize Chinese sovereignty. China stopped 
the advances of her troops and declared she had no intention of 
making Tibet a Chinese province. In 1913 the Tibetan authorities 
declared the independence of Tibet, and Chinese officials withdrew 
from the country in October 1913. Thereupon delegates from Eng- 
land, China, and Tibet met at Simla and in April 1914 arranged 
Tibetan affairs. These representatives came to an agreement, but 
the Chinese government would not subsequently accept it. It divided 
Tibetan territory into two parts : 

(1) Outer Tibet was to be a separate province. It was to include 
the province of Chiando and was to have an autonomous gov- 
ernment, only nominally under Chinese authority. Neither 
England nor China was to interfere with internal affairs, but 
their agents could visit Lhasa. 

(2) Inner Tibet was to include Litang and Batang, and was to be 
under the direct control of China. 

Outer Tibet has therefore become practically an independent state Tibet now 
under the guarantee of Great Britain and as a dependency of hers, ^ft-^i^ 
on the ground that the Chinese government, though it repeatedly protection 
sent mihtary expeditions into the country, was unable to stop disorders 
that in turn created trouble on the Indian frontier, a source of danger 
to Great Britain. 

To avoid those minor conflicts out of which larger issues grow, Need for 
the frontiers of Tibet should be definitely established as soon as ^oSrs 
possible, with the assistance and agreement of the local native i^i Tibet 
governors. Neither those in the direction of India nor those that 
separate Outer from Inner Tibet have been fixed. 



CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE 



European 

commercial 

penetratioQ 



THE FAR EAST 

In reaching for the commerce of the Far East, Em^opean powers 
found themselves confronted by two estabhshed nations, China and 
Japan, whom they could not reduce to the status of dependencies. 
Japan has maintained her sovereignty intact and has taken her place 
among the great powers ; China, far stronger and richer potentially, 
but actually weak and now disorderly as to internal government, has 
not been able to ward off the repeated encroachments of the Euro- 
pean powers. 

In the islands of the Pacific, on the contrary, there was httle diffi- 
culty in achieving complete ownership, for the primitive inhabitants 
were easily subdued or won over by the Europeans. Objects of 
rivalry at first for their raw materials, many of the islands came to 
be considered mportant for their strategic value also. They were 
regarded as an approach to the mainland of Asia, and their possession 
was thought to be essential to the control of the trade of eastern 
Asia. Thus, through trade, Europe was brought across the Pacific 
and Indian oceans to the doors of the Far East. Relations were at 
first sporadic, as at Macao, near Hongkong (Portuguese), Deshima, 
at Nagasaki (Dutch), and Formosa (both Portuguese and Dutch). 
Later they were persistent and even aggressive, as when the English 
got Hongkong (1842) and the French by successive steps (1863, 1864, 
1867, 1884, 1896) established themselves in Indo-China. Each ac- 
quisition furnished local subtropical products and a market for Euro- 
pean goods, and became also a base for trade conquests farther afield. 



Great 
Britain's 
interest in 
the raw 
materials 
of the Far 
East 



THE CONTROL OF RAW MATERIALS IN THE FAR EAST 

When it is reahzed how large a part tropical and subtropical prod- 
ucts play in modern industrial and commercial hfe, it seems natural that 
it should be the policy of Great Rritain, the largest trading empire 
in the world, to get as great a share as possible of the raw materials 
and trade resources of the Far East, and she has pursued this policy 
with marked singleness of purpose ever since she acquired the Suez 
Canal. To take a single instance, — through her control of the free 
ports of Hongkong and Singapore she has made London one of the 
chief world markets for rubber, tea, spices, jute, gums, and hides. 
With her huge war debt, trade control and development are matters 

490 



The Far East 



491 




o/luzot?1? 



ECONOMIC RESOURCES 

inn Coal 

r^^^ Tea 

Cotton 
Silk 
^^ Industrial districts 
-*—• Main railroads 



Fig. 243. Some of the economic elements in the political geography of the Far East. 



of vital importance. She has the banking facihties and also the 
commercial experience of the past to increase production in new lands. 
In recent years the trade motive has also become a more active factor 
in Japan's foreign pohcy, especially in relation to eastern Asia. These 
two powers, as well as France, will seek to improve their financial 
and ocean transportation facilities in the Far East. 

In the past the United States has bought the products of the Far Manila as 
East chiefly through Great Britain, Japan, and Germany. Her J,r®Ameri- 
annual purchases of Oriental products just before the World War can trade 

interests 

exceeded $200,000,000, and her exports were more than $100,000,000. in the 
The largest single source of American trade in the Orient is Japan Orient 



492 



The New World 



(total of nearly $150,000,000 in 1913). The Straits Settlements 
come next, Singapore being a great port for the raw materials from 
the East Indian region — tin, hides, spices, rice, fish, tungsten, and 
rubber. Great Britain and Japan have maintained their trade ad- 
vantages in the Far East, because they have their own ports there. 
Americans have been operating chiefly from Manila, which is not a 
free port. It now has large modern piers and extensive warehouses, 
and were it to become a free port, it would have an enormous influence 
in developing the wealth of the Far East and the Phihppines. In the 
past twenty years American trade with the Pliihppines, chiefly in hemp, 
sugar, vegetable oils, and tobacco, has risen to $50,000,000 yearly. 



Racial 

questions 
in the Far 

East 



Tendency 
of Jap- 
anese emi- 
grants to 
go to 
southern 
climates 



RACIAL FACTORS 

In the Far East and the Pacific the world's racial problems reach 
their present climax of intensity ; here the white race comes into con- 
tact with the yellow race, a part of which — the Japanese — is striv- 
ing to win assent to the principle of race equality. The differences 
between the two races in mode of life and ideals, and even in religion, 
are very great, and there is no tendency among them toward inter- 
marriage. In Canada, Australia, and the United States there are 
special laws restricting immigration of Chinese and Japanese. The 
immigration question has become acute in British Columbia and 
Cahfornia, where the Japanese birth rate is rather high and where, 
even without immigration, there is danger that the Japanese problem 
may have a serious outcome, owing to the rapid growth of bitter 
feeling among the labor unions, the unorganized laboring men, and 
the landowners. 

A number of colonies of Japanese rice farmers live on the coast 
of Brazil and there is a colony in Lower California, Mexico. In Sao 
Paulo, Brazil, where laborers on the coff'ee plantations grew scarce 
during the World War, there was increased Japanese immigration, 
encouraged by subsidies from Japan and the welcome of the Brazilian 
government. There are now 20,000 Japanese laborers in Sao Paulo 
alone, of whom 4000 own coffee plantations. 

In Europe, where comparatively crowded lands do not tempt 
immigration from the Far East, the problem of the yellow race 
scarcely exists. The harsh climate of northern Europe, as con- 
trasted with the relatively mild climate of Japan, also has a deter- 
rent effect. The tendency of the Japanese is to move into the warmer 
belts, like California, Hawaii, and the Philippines (Fig. 257). This 
tendency causes some of the people of Austraha to be apprehensive 



The Far East 493 

lest large numbers of Japanese may settle in the East Indies and 
Polynesia and become their unwelcome neighbors (Fig. 257 and 
related text, page 5'iQ). It is argued that the Japanese multiply so 
rapidly and live so cheaply that they drive out the white workman 
wherever they compete with him on equal terms. 

At the Peace Conference of Paris in 1919, the Japanese plenipo- Failure of 
tentiaries long insisted that restrictions of immigration based on Japanese 
race should be finally removed the world over, but to this proposi- secure 
tion the other powers would not give their consent. equauty 

(A) The Rise of Japan to the Rank of a World Power 

When Japan was still a kind of hermit kingdom, both her foreign japan until 
and her internal problems were simple. By centuries of experiment, her^^t^ * 
life had become adjusted to resources. Her people lived apart from kingdom 
the rest of the world. For more than two centuries before Com- 
modore Perry's visit to Japan, her sole point of contact with western 
nations was a single trading station on the island of Deshima opposite 
Nagasaki, where there was a limited commerce with the Dutch. 

EMERGENCE OF JAPAN 

It was in 1853 that the United States government sent Commo- 
dore Perry with an American fleet, demanding Japanese protection 
for American sailors and property wrecked on the coast, and per- 
mission for American ships to use Japanese ports as a base for food 
or for trade. The Perry expedition forced Japan into the current of 
modern international life. 

After 1868 Japan modified her political and social institutions in Radical 
what is probably the most complete and radical change of its kind intheTo- 
that has ever occurred in the world's history. The basis of Japanese ^/ai and po- 
social and military organization had been feudalism. In 1868 the sys- of japan 
tem was abolished by revolution, and a national spirit sprang up that 
was to be used as a powerful instrument in empire-building. The 
first railroad was begun in 1870 ; today there are nearly eight thou- 
sand miles of rail. In 1872, military service became universal and 
obligatory. A constitution was granted in 1889, and Parliament met 
for the first time in 1890. 

It was just in the midst of this process of modernization that Japan 
consolidated her island possessions. In 1875 she got from Russia 
the Kurile Islands, thus rounding out her domain on the north. In 
exchange she relinquished her claim to the island of Saklialin, the 
southern half of which was again recovered in 1905 ; the northern 



494 



The New World 



SAKHALINP 




JAPAN IN THE FAR EAST 

Japanese territory 
Japanese spheres of influence 
Railroads in operation 

under construction 



►tfffH 



Fig. 244. The field of Japanese ownership and influence in eastern Asia. Key to numbers; 
1, southern China; 2, Shantung; 3, Mongolia; 4, Sakhalin (inset); 5, Manchuria (military oc- 
cupation following the war). A portion of the northern end of the island of Sakhalin appears 
in the upper right-hand corner of the main map. 



The Far East 495 

half is occupied at the present time. In 1876 she seized the Liukiu 
Islands, which extend southward almost to Formosa. In 1895 as a 
result of her war with China she won Formosa, the richest of her 
island prizes, with a population of 3,650,000. Her island empire 
fringes the coast of Asia for 3000 miles and embraces an area of 261,000 
square miles. 

The merchants of Japan turned to overseas trade and her business Japanese 
men began to manufacture articles of commerce. At the present time business 
the Japanese trader can be found everywhere through the East, from 
Sumatra and Singapore up through the Philippines and in all the 
open ports of the coast of China. Japanese banks and warehouses 
sprang up in India during the World War, and Japanese merchants 
went in numbers into the Malay States, buying up rich concessions. 
Japan's commerce with Siam doubled during the war, and in the 
same period she increased her trade with the Dutch East Indies five- 
fold. In New Zealand the Japanese have won over the former trade 
of Germany and have taken away much of British trade also. A fleet 
of Japanese steamers makes regular runs to Seattle and San Francisco 
and another fleet plies between Japan and the west coast of South 
America. Japanese trade expansion on a huge scale in southern Asia, 
the Far East, and the Pacific, is one of the really marvelous economic 
consequences of the World War. 

EXPANSION TOWARD THE MAINLAND OF ASIA 

The rise of Japan to the rank of a world power was marked by Two mod- 
two wars in which she won striking military victories : the war with w'on^"^ ( 
China in 1894-1895 and the war with Russia in 1904-1905. But at J^p**^ 
the close of the first war Japan's military success was foUowed by 
diplomatic humiliation. She had driven the Chinese out of Korea, 
invaded Manchuria, and occupied the Liao-tung peninsula. China 
hurriedly agreed to make peace, and by the treaty of Shimonoseki, 
April 1895, she ceded Port Arthur (Fig. 244), the Liao-tung peninsula, 
Formosa, and the Pescadores Islands (west of Formosa) o Japan; 
she further agreed to pay a large indemnity and to recognize the 
complete independence of Korea. 

It seemed that at last Japan stood firmly planted on the mainland japan com- 
with an outlet for her rapidly growing population. But Russia J^Ufdraw 
stepped in and combined with two other western nations — France fro™ the 
and Germany — to compel the eastern nation to give up Port Arthur mainland 
and the Liao-tung peninsula and withdraw from the mainland, on 
the ground that, near Peking, Japan would be a menace to the peace 



496 



The New World 



China com- 
pelled by 
Germany 
to give a 
concession 
jn Shantung 



Further 

concessions 

secured by 

Russia, 

France, 

and Great 

Britain 



The Anglo- 
Japanese 
Alliance 



Definite 
Japanese 
gains from 
the Russo- 
Japanese 
War 



of the Orient. All parties in Japan now began to look forward to 
the time when they could strike at Russia. 

But the great powers were thinking much of themselves, their trade 
privileges and possible yellow hegemony, and very little of China, 
when they bade Japan leave the mainland of Asia. In 1897 Germany 
sent a fleet to China, ostensibly because two German missionaries had 
been murdered in the province of Shantung. As a result China was 
compelled to give Germany a ninety-nine year lease of the fine har- 
bor of Kiaochow and a surrounding area of more than 250 square 
miles, besides large commercial privileges in the province of Shan- 
tung, which has a population of nearly 40,000,000 Chinese (Fig. 246). 

Russia also seized the opportunity of robbing a weakened China. 
It seemed clear that she intended ultimately to annex the whole of 
the great province of Manchuria. For the time being she took a 
twenty-five year lease of Port Arthur, from which she had driven 
Japan by diplomatic weapons in 1895. England acquired Wei-hai- 
wei on much the same terms. China was forced to open a nrnnber 
of additional treaty ports and to permit foreign capitahsts to build 
railroads and develop mines. Weak, pacifistic, rich, undeveloped, 
China appeared to be in the same class as Africa ; the powers seemed 
to regard the country as so much booty to be divided among them- 
selves. 

Then in 1902, for the first time in modern history, an Asiatic power 
— Japan — made a defensive alhance with a European power — Great 
Britain — on terms of virtual equality. This meant that in the 
impending war with Russia, who was constantly adding to her armed 
forces in Manchuria and about Port Arthur, Japan would have the 
help of Great Britain if any other power came to the help of Russia.^ 

In February 1904 the Russo-Japanese War began, to last until 
September 1905. It was closed by the treaty of Portsmouth, named 
after Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where the peace delegates as- 
sembled on the invitation of President Roosevelt. Japan had gained 
wisdom as a result of her previous experience with the great powers, 
and pressed insistently for territorial advantages ; Russia was made 
to recognize Japan's paramount interest in Korea, though that 
country was to be independent; Russia transferred to Japan her 
rights at Port Arthur and in the Liao-tung peninsula, and evacuated 
Manchuria and the southern half of the island of Sakhalin. 

In July 1916 the Japanese and Russian governments signed a 



^ For the present status of the Anglo-Japanese treaty see page 26. 



The Far East 497 

treaty which was practically an alliance. By this treaty Russia rec- 
ognized Japan's rights over the bulk of China, while Japan recog- 
nized Russia's special interests in China's western territory, espe- 
cially MongoHa and Turkestan. While this treaty has no present 
force owing to the political disorganization of Russia, it is important 
as one step in Japan's long and hard struggle to force recognition of 
her alleged special rights in China. By acts such as these Japan was 
to outdo the western powers in the penetration of China and the 
winning of special privileges. 

Up to the time that Japan entered the Chinese field, other nations Policy 
had won special privileges there without arousing acute anxiety in open Door 
the United States government. But so comprehensive were the claims 
of the Japanese, so aggressive their methods, so favorable their geo- 
graphical relations, and so marked their racial advantages, that the 
full import of a foreign penetration of China was quickly reaUzed in 
America. China being weak and her officials corrupt, she could 
always be made to grant concessions, even though these interfered 
with her domestic hfe or threatened her territorial integrity. From 
this time forward, the United States indirectly played the role of 
the champion of China. The Japanese question thereafter was not 
solely a matter of restricting Japanese immigration, but also a matter 
of ending the period of unfair conunercial rivalry in China so that ter- 
ritorial rivalry and war might not inevitably follow. Equality of com- ; 
mercial opportunity was called the principle of the "Open Door," 
a principle fraught with great importance to the world's peace. j 

Eventually, by the Lansing- Ishii agreement of 1914, the policy 
of the Open Door was modified to the extent of recognizing Japan's 
special interest in China's future, which some statesmen defend as 
parallel to the course of the United States in the West Indies and 
which others regard as a regrettable admission. 

RESULTS OF THE WORLD WAR FOR JAPAN 

In the World War of 1914-1918, Japan was obhged by the terms Extension 
of her treaty with Great Britain to come to the aid of her ally. She gais^dur-^^ 
took Kiaochow and the Marshall and Carofine Islands. German jfl^^^^^. 

World War 

New Guinea was taken by Australian troops, German Samoa by New of 1914- 
Zealanders. German power was thus swept from the Pacific and the ^^^ 
Far East. What new ahgnment of forces would be made by the 
peace treaty.^ The war had made but little drain on Japan's re- 
sources. By contrast, the Russo-Japanese War cost her about $1,000- 
000,000 and 230,000 in killed and wounded. Under the bounties 



498 



The New World 



Japanese 
trade gains 
in Far 
Eastern 
markets 



Japanese 
control of 
Shantung 



and subsidies granted to the Japanese mercantile marine, the gross 
tonnage increased from 255,000 tons in 1896 to 2,300,000 tons in 1919. 
Shipbuilding and iron and steel industries have grown enormously 
as a result of the war. Japanese merchants and shipowners have 
invaded every accessible market. The results of their enterprise 
are extraordinary. 

Between 1914 and 1917 the total exports of Japan had increased 
170 per cent in value ; to Europe 143 per cent ; to. America 181 per 
cent. In the same period her imports from Asia increased 63 per cent; 
from America 252 per cent ; from Europe they decreased 61 per cent. 
From India she received 38 per cent more goods in 1917 than in 1914, 
and she exported thither nearly 400 per cent more. In the PhiHp- 
pines, Japanese exports and imports more than doubled during the 
war. The Austrahan and New Zealand markets have been deluged 
with Japanese goods — clothing, hardware, chemicals, jewelry, toys, 
silk and cotton cloth, electrical macliinery, porcelain ware, and even 
hats and buttons. Eastern Siberia and China are commercially 
dependent upon Japan. Korean trade is now ahnost exclusively 
in the hands of the Japanese. 

Every Japanese resource of diplomacy, of industry, of financial 
power and technic, has been organized to penetrate the trade areas 
of the Orient. In the same period American trade in the Far East 
also has greatly increased — with Japan itself, with the Dutch East 
Indies, with the Philippines. Upon the relations of these two powers 
in the Pacific trade realm will depend in large part the future peace 
of the world. 

For the Far East the principal result of the World War and of the 
peace arrangements that followed it, has been to turn Shantung and 
Kiaochow over to the Japanese for an indefinite, or at least unstated, 
period of years : in other words, Japan takes over Germany's former 
possessions. Japan has sought to estabhsh herself in control of the 
Chinese Eastern Railway, thus shutting off European access across 
the continent to the Pacific. She has set her heart on the com- 
mercial development of Shantung and of the tributaries to the Tsing- 
tau-Chinan railway, as well as the railway itself. She is firmly es- 
tabhshed at Port Arthur. Peking lives under a Japanese shadow. 
AH the northern gateways of China are sentineled by the Japanese 
fleet. Korea, though solemnly promised autonomy in 1905 by treaty 
between Japan and Russia, was annexed outright in 1910. 

The position of Korea may have the gravest consequences for 
Japan and therefore deserves special consideration. For centuries the 



The Far East 



499 




M 



500 



The New World 



Korea 
under 
Japanese 
control 



country enjoyed only the shadow of sovereignty. It was long sub- 
ject to either China or Japan, paying tribute and acknowledging its] 
subordinate position by treaty. The war between Japan and Chinal 
in 1894 was the direct result of competition between these two! 
powers for the control of Korea. The Japanese victory was fol-j 
lowed by the proclamation of Korean independence in January 1895. 

Meanwhile Russia was advancing into northern China. Korea) 
borders Manchuria for five hundred miles, and it lies between two 
naval bases — Vladivostok and Port Arthur — which Russia then 
owned. Agreements with Japan were made by Korea in 1896 and 
1898, ostensibly to give equal opportunities ; but by taking advantage 
of internal political dissensions, the Russians obtained a powerful hold 
over the reigning king, who from 1896 to 1900 gave them valuable 
concessions in timber, fisheries, and ports and let them construct 
mihtary roads. The result was war between Japan and Russia, and 
Korea became a Japanese prize of war. Promised a civil admin- 
istration in 1919, Korea is still in control of the military authorities. 
One oppressive measure has followed another. Domination by an 
alien government has bred resentment, then violence. Japan's every 
act of sternness has been met by renewed hostility on the part of the 
Koreans. Patriotic societies have been formed, vast public protests 
arranged. Assassination of Japanese soldiers and ofiicials has led to 
wholesale retahatory violence by the Japanese military forces. The 
material improvement of the country — afforestation of bare hillsides, 
the building of railways, the improvement of agricultural methods — 
does not offset the sense of humiliation that arises from the daily 
interference of Japanese officials in the life of the Korean people. 

Corruption and weakness are the historic traits of the Koreans. 
They have never been able to stand alone. The price of their 
weakness is foreign domination, never a welcome thing, and here 
especially distasteful because of militaristic methods of control that 
have followed outright annexation of Korea by Japan. 



Chinese 
opposition 
to Japanese 
control of 
Shantung 



CONFLICT OF CHINESE AND JAPANESE INTERESTS AT SHANTUNG 

By the settlement of 1919 (the treaty of Versailles) nothing was 
restored to China of all those privileges which the powers had taken 
away. The disposition of Shantung (Figs. 244 and 246) aroused a 
feeling of national disaster among the Chinese. Forty million Chinese 
became, to all intents and purposes, Japanese subjects, though Shan- 
tung is one of the richest provinces of China and is sentimentally 
and historically dear to the Chinese. They speak of it as "the cradle 



The Far East 



501 



ortArtliur 




Fig. 246. The province of Shantung, home of 40,000,000 Chinese, recently placed under Japanese 
sovereignty for an indefinite period. Until 1914 Germany held the territory inclosed by the 
broken line about Kiaochow in lease from the Chinese government. 

of Chinese civilization," "the Holy Land of the Chinese people." 
So great was the feehng aroused in China by the award of Shan- 
tung to Japan that a popular boycott against Japanese goods rapidly 
spread. It is estimated that at one time Japan's trade with China 
was reduced 80 per cent. Japan in Shantung holds the economic key 
to the country — the railways. At Tsingtau she has possession of 
an economic gateway. In holding both she stands in the very midst 
of the Chinese commercial realm, and is feared the more because she 
has an organized and powerful government and a highly developed 
industrial system. Strategically her position is no less unportant. 

Japan has agreed to exercise no political rights in the peninsula japan's 
and to retire from it at the end of an unspecified term. The great p™™*^®^ 
powers have the opportunity of proving their sincerity in seeking to 
win China's assent to the treaty of Versailles (which put Japan into 
Shantung) by making no further invasions of China's sovereign rights, 
by developing her resources on terms that will give the Chinese a 
share of their own natural riches, and by demanding for the foreigner 
no unwarranted special privileges. 

Japan has further agreed neither to make exclusive economic use of 



502 



The New World 



Japan's 
important 
economic 
" rights " 
in China 



Prospect 
that Japan 
willfulfiU 
her obli- 
gations 



the port of Tsingtau, nor to give herself or her nationals the benefit 
of lower rates or other special privileges over the railways. Japan 
secures, however, the right of maintaining a Japanese settlement 
at Tsingtau ; the ownership of the Tsingtau-Chinan railway is to be a 
joint Sino- Japanese enterprise, and Japan is to own the coal mines 
tributary to the railway and to have rights in several other railways 
which may be built : this much is legally hers, on the basis that these 
are economic rights once held by Germany and now forfeited by her 
to Japan. 

Doubt has been expressed as to whether Japan can successfully 
withstand the very grave temptation to make her economic rights the 
basis of a quarrel with China from which she would issue with increased 
pohtical rights in Shantung. The famous "twenty-one demands" 
of May 1915, made upon China by Japan under the threat of war, 
have not been forgotten.^ But for the misgivings aroused by them, 
faith in Japanese poUcy in the Far East would be stronger. 



Unequal 

population 

densities 

one of the 

ultimate 

causes of 

war 



Japan's 
needs for 
colonial 
outlets 



THE PRESSURE OF POPULATION 

One of the oldest and most powerful basic causes of war is an un- 
equal birth rate on opposite sides of a boundary line. From the 
great migrations of history down to the recent World War, men have 
always looked across their international Une-fences and envied the 
wealth of their neighbors. Germany, for instance, before 1914 had 
more than 65,000,000 people and France had less than 40,000,000, 
and their areas were but httle different. 

Japan is today in the situation of a country that must overflow its 
boundaries. Only about one sixth of her total area of 176,000 square 
miles (including Formosa, but not Korea) is under cultivation, because 
so much of it at the north is cold — too cold, that is, for typical Japan- 
ese agriculture — and a large part of the rest is mountainous. Her 
poets sing the praises of Fujiyama, but the moxmtain cannot grow rice. 
Sixty-one million people are crowded together on an area only a Httle 
larger than that of California. The average size of a farm is two and 
a half acres. 

1 As originally presented to China on 18 January 1915, the Japanese demands were 
twenty-one in number. By them Japan was to acquire former German rights in China, 
and China was not to lease any part of the province of Shantung to a third power. Japan 
obtained also valuable railroad concessions, the opening of important cities and towns in 
Shantung as commercial ports, a lease of the southern Manchm-ian and other railways, 
special trading privileges in eastern Mongolia, and mining rights in southern Manchuria and 
eastern Inner Mongolia, as well as other valuable concessions in mines, railways, and harbor 
works. China agreed to employ influential Japanese advisers in political, financial, military, 
and pohce departments. The demands involved the virtual surrender of China to Japan. 



The Far East 



503 




Fig. 247. Sketch map of the population density of Japan and Korea on 31 December 1913, 
according to data supplied by N. Yamasaki of the Geographical Institute of the University of 
Tokyo. Scale, 1 : 16,000,000. From Jefferson, the Geographical Review, Vol. 2, 1916- 



Before Japan was opened to European trade her people had by 
long experience learned to be self-sustaining. They cultivated every 
available spot and Uved frugally. When a whole people has practiced 
thrift and industry for many generations, it acquires a stability that 
gives it relatively great commercial power. With the growth of foreign 
trade the Japanese were able to export some of their products and 
import food, with an immediate improvement in standards of hving. 
To extend these advantages requires still more trade, and this invites 
both territorial expansion and the stimulation of industry. 

Social and economic experimentation are the natural consequences 
of these conditions among the Japanese people, responsive as they are 
to the progressive thought of advanced western nations. In the 
past few years there has been a marked drift of the rural population 
to the cities, where it becomes part of a restless industrial class. This 



504 



The New World 



^gK^ 


r 


^ ^^^P*>r-:-r^i:.'5i^^^^J 


..^^^^H 


P^^'^^^^^^^^^^^^HIP^ ..jJ^^^ 






9^^B ^^jHI^ 


BVMKiiljS^^ 






K ^^T' ■'^"' 


^C 




tS^^^^^^^^^^^^^B *1 j4b£s BMhp '^-riiMaiAi^^l 


i 


1 


ZV -r^^Sfl^. 


Bt- ^ ■ , 






L ..- ••■ . 




l^^^^ag^' !^^7^ 


::"■' J 









Fig. 248. Japanese village and adjacent farms — a typical scene. 



Brawn Bros. 



creates a lack of tenants for the landed proprietors. Where rural 
population declines one may see, side by side with the untilled fields 
of the well-to-do, the tiny garden of the poor farmer. The inevitable 
result is rural discontent, such as in Europe has led to the division of 
the large landed estates (page 394). Some farmers have emigrated 
to Hokkaido, one of the large and relatively cold northern islands of 
the Japanese archipelago, where they have adopted modern agricul- 
tural practice. Wishing to become self-supporting in the matter of 
wool, Japan grants annual subsidies to farmers who keep sheep. The 
eastern Siberian realm and adjoining parts of Manchuria and Mon- 
golia are the natural fields of expansion for stock farming. With these 
virgin empires in her hands, Japan will let go of strategic points in 
Siberia only with great reluctance. She is still in possession of them, 
though at one time (1919) she had agreed to evacuate her troops. 



The Far East 505 

Like Germany, Japan has seen her colonists go out and swell the The main- 
populations of other lands. She desires to keep them together under Asia as an 
her own flag, and she can do this only if she provides the land and ou«etfor 
the business opportunities. Therefore she has looked westward across Japanese 
the sea, where she beholds fair lands thinly populated. Manchuria 
and Mongolia are empires in geographical extent, far larger than 
Japan, and in parts of them are fertile plains that could support a 
dense population. There are vast pastures for the production of 
meat and wool, two products that in the past fifteen years have 
become increasingly and alarmingly scarcer in the world. There are 
oil and coal and iron, and her supply of these things Japan, with 
rapidly growing industries, desires to augment. 

To aid production and industry, Japan has recently created a Domestic 
Depcirtment of Agriculture and Commerce, which plans to assist ^l^^^^^' 
manufacturers in the solution of industrial problems and problems of of industry 
the export trade. The department is authorized to grant liberal sub- 
sidies. Japanese shipping subsidies are among the largest in the world. 
Great shipyards have been built recently. On raw materials im- 
ported into Japan there are rebates, and these enable the Japanese 
manufacturers to compete successfully with European countries and 
with America in many lines of trade in China. In some cases the 
government actually guarantees a certain percentage of profit on 
home manufactures. 



FUTURE POLICY OF JAPAN 

In forecasting their future relations with Japan, the great powers Problems 
(particularly the United States) find themselves confronted by these Jft^r?r|. 
questions : lations 

with Japan 

(1) WiU Japan push her assertion of race equality to the point 
of demanding equal treatment of Japanese and Americans 
in California, and of Japanese and British in Australia, New 
Zealand, and British Columbia ; and if she does demand this, 
wiU she be able and wiUing to go to war for it ? 

(2) Is her "mainland" policy in eastern ^sia designed to carry 
the Japanese frontier far into that continent, and especially 
into China, with the object of gaining special privileges for 
Japanese trade to the exclusion of white traders ? 

(3) Will she abandon Shantung at the end of an indefinite 
period, as she has agreed to do .^ And, if she does abandon it, 
wiU her merchants not have so strong a hold on the political 



I 



506 The New World 

life of the province that they will inevitably be brought into 
conflict with the Chinese government when it resumes the 
exercise of its sovereign rights? (Germany promised in 1864 
to hold a plebiscite in Slesvig-Holstein, and Chile promised to 
hold a plebiscite in Tacna-Arica after the war with Peru in 
1879-1884 ; both failed to keep these solemn promises.) 

(4) Will she exercise her mandatary in the Marshall and Caroline 
Islands in such a way that she will win the approval of the 
other great powers, or will she make every effort to remain 
there without supervision or even under the criticism or dis- 
approval of the other interested powers ? 

(5) Will she develop local seK-government in Korea or will she 
continue her present policy of repression and persecution ? 



The test 
of Japanese 
idealism to 
come in 
the near 
future 



It is easy to reply that criticisms similar to those made of Japan 
might be made of the other great powers and that nowhere else in the 
world have these powers themselves given exhibitions of more selfish 
ambitions than in the Far East, at Japan's very door. But on the 
other hand it must be remembered that all of Japan's moderniza- 
tion dates from the past fifty years. She has the forms of western 
civilization, but has she also its ideaUsm.^^ For side by side with the 
old selfish deplorable policies of the great powers there grew up in 
the modern western states another set of ideas. Thoughtful men 
saw special trade privileges and imperiahstic national policies and the 
oppression of weak peoples give rise to war, and they have said : 
"War is a fine and a noble thing when men fight to kill ignoble ambi- 
tions and to defeat selfish and cruel oppressors ; but is it A fine thing 
when men kill each other for dollars and the pride of kings and the 
sport of persecuting a 'racial' minority?" We are not sure that 
Japan is of this mood. There is a powerful miUtaristic element in 
high places but little affected by the lesson of Germany's defeat; 
there is a sense of pride and ambition characteristic of the young 
rather than the mature nation. Furthermore, there is a racial ambi- 
tion mixed with that pride and tinged by a sense of the humiliations 
of the past, when the great powers gained privileges in the Far East 
which they denied to Japan. Finally, the Peace Conference of Paris, 
to Japan's chagrin, decided not to adopt the principle of race equafity. 

The convergence of European and American political and economic 
interests upon the Far East will probably bring Japan's political 
program and the ideals of her people into great prominence. The 
real test of her diplomatic power and her ideahsm is yet to come. 



The Far East 507 

(B) China's Immediate Problems 

China would not sign the treaty of Versailles, feeling that her China's 
rights had been ignored in the Shantung settlement. She therefore unsettfeS' 
confronts five major problems : ^ problems 

(1) She has yet to make peace with Germany and to complete 
international or diplomatic arrangements with the Allied and 
Associated Powers. (However, she became a member of the 
League of Nations by signing the Austrian and other peace 
treaties which have incorporated in them the League of Nations 
Covenant.) 

(2) She has Japan as a neighbor on the mainland, a thing she has 
dreaded ever since 1894 because of the economic stranglehold 
which she fears that progressive and ambitious Japan may 
secure, in pursuance of her "mainland" policy in eastern Asia. 

(3) She has not yet ceased to fear aggression by the western powers, 
who have taken treaty ports, concessions, and territory in the 
past. (For example. Great Britain was ceded the island of 
Hongkong in 1842 after the Opium War ; Germany took 
Kiaochow in 1897 ; Russia took Port Arthur in 1898.) 

(4) She must make with foreign capitalists financial arrangements 
that will enable her to develop her resources in a manner favor- 
able to her own interests. 

(5) She is in the midst of an internal pofitical and mihtary struggle, 
the end of which is still in doubt. 

How came China to her present unfortunate pass? The Chinese Howcwna 
were a highly civiKzed nation when the Europeans were still in the ^eak 
Bronze Age. With her external commerce dependent upon sailing 
vessels, cut off by high mountains and deserts from western civiliza- 
tion, China developed a culture much higher than that of surrounding 
countries. She was a civiUzed nation in contrast to the barbarians 
on her frontiers. Japan borrowed much from her. But the Chinese 
were isolated and, following Confucius, their greatest philosopher, 
extremely pacifistic. The Chinese despised the "foreign devils"; 
they desired to be left alone. All of this might be sound philosophy 
if the rest of the world would leave them alone in return. 

^ Besides these five, China still has her opium problem. By the treaty which closed the 
Opium War with England (1842) the opium trade was restricted and later abolished, but 
the illicit introduction of opium and morphia continues, to the great harm of the people. 
For example, at Macao the Portuguese permit trade in opium and the use of opium. 
By the Opium Convention of 1912 the powers were to put further and more stringent re- 
strictions upon the opium trade, and the Third International Opium Conference of 1914 
sought means of putting the Convention in operation. The war interrupted the termina- 
tion of effective arrangements, but the treaty of Versailles, if signed by China, provides 
promising guarantees. 



508 



The New World 



ECONOMIC PENETRATION OF CHINA BY FOREIGN POWERS 



China's 
potential 
resources 
and com- 
mercial 
power 




/ Montreaf 
Z Pittsburgh 

3 Cotumbus 

4 Savannah 

5 Duluth 
""' e Topeka 

7 Tucson 

8 San frsncisco 



The economic ad- 
vances of outside na- 
tions have penetrated 
the whole economic life 
of China. With strong 
navies and a determined 
policy these nations de- 
mand and get "rights," 
concessions, exemp- 
tions, franchises, almost 
innumerable. They 
have estabhshed open 
ports (page 511), super- 
vised the use of bor- 
rowed money, sought 

Fig. 249. The area of China compared with the United j • • . .• . i 

States. Note the length of the Great Wall. The key in the aaimmstrative COUtrOl 

lower left-hand corner will serve to locate a few American q£ tcrritorV adiaCCUt 

cities for comparison. / ^ 

to the railways over 
which they have practically sovereign control, secured exclusive 
exploitation privileges, exempted themselves from Chinese taxes on 
imported material, and even maintained separate post offices. 

It is the great wealth of China that attracts foreign countries 
to her. She is the world's largest producer of antimony; she has 
large lead, tin, and oil deposits. She has the largest undeveloped iron 
and coal deposits of aU the nations in the world. The anthracite coal 
deposits of Shansi and the regions adjacent are equal to those of 
Pennsylvania, and the quantity of bituminous coal is at least as great 
as that in the United States. The iron deposits of the Hankow dis- 
trict are in control of the Japanese. Those of Manchuria will almost 
certainly fall into the same hands, for the Japanese are specially anxious 
to increase their iron and steel production. Of value to Japanese 
plans is the opposition of the Chinese government to granting further 
concessions to foreign capitahsts. The Chinese buy the concessions ; 
then the Japanese buy out the Chinese owners. In 1915 Japan ob- 
tained exclusive mining rights in eastern Mongolia and in Shantung, 
to mention two of the most important acquisitions. 

Between 1894 and 1898 the struggle for concessions reached its 
climax and each one of the big European powers got its sphere of 
influence in China. . 



The Far East 



509 




510 



The New World 



Chinese 
seclusion 
and the 
opening of 
treaty ports 



Status of 
the treaty 
ports 



It was as if the Russians and the Enghsh had just seized rival 
reservations on Long Island and the Jersey coast, commanding New 
York City ; as if the EngUsh had wrenched away Charleston ; the 
Germans, Philadelphia; the French, New Orleans; and Cossacks 
were garrisoned in strategic points throughout New England. It 
was as if the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railway were 
manned and guarded by Slavs, the New York Central by Relgians, the 
Pennsylvania by Prussians; as if the Pittsburg mines were handed 
over en bloc to an English corporation, and the Russians had exclusive 
mining rights to the gold of Alaska's Yukon region. Bates. 

By 1899 the process had gone so far that it looked as if the princi- 
ple of the equality of commercial advantage in weak and powerless 
China would be entirely set aside, and therefore the United States 
attempted to establish the principle of the Open Door (page 497). 

The Treaty Ports 

At the opening of the 19th century Canton was the only port 
open to European trade. By the treaty of Nanking, which closed the 
Opium War (1840-1842), the Chinese opened five treaty ports to 
European powers, Japan, and the United States, for foreign residence 
and trade, and ceded Hongkong to the British. Since then China 
has opened, or has been compelled to open, a large number of other 
ports. In Manchuria, since 1900, she has opened a number of treaty 
ports under pressure from Japan; since 1898 she has voluntarily 
opened a number of desirable ports, with a view to keeping them 
under Chinese control. Of this class are the towns of Chinwangtao, the 
winter port of Tientsin, and Tsingtau, the capital of Shantung. There 
are no foreign concessions in the voluntarily opened ports ; in them the 
international settlement, or "trade quarter" where foreigners reside, 
is under Chinese administration. 

At present China has 56 regular treaty ports and 8 voluntarily 
opened ports, 25 ports of call, and 16 frontier caravan stations, or 
marts. In agreement with the twenty-one demands presented by 
Japan to China in 1915, China promised to open additional ports in 
Shantung and in eastern Inner MongoUa (Fig. 251). 

Great Britain has concessions at a number of places ; for example, 
Amoy, Canton, Hankow, Tientsin, and Shanghai (Fig. 251). Japan 
has concessions at Amoy, Foochow, Hangchow, Hankow, Newchwang, 
and Tientsin. Russia had concessions at Hankow, Newchwang and 
Tientsin ; France at Canton, Hankow, Shanghai, and Tientsin. The 
United States has given up practically all its concessions. Belgium 
and Italy have concessions at Tientsin; and Germany and Austria- 



The Far East 



511 



1 «-> 




< 




CO 




^ 




Z3 




o 




LU 


O 


"< 


o 

o 


li_ Od 


■p' 


o 


O 




c/> 


o 


MAP 
INESE 


o 

x: 

00 


o 

Q- 


o 

ID 






LU 


V} 


LU 




Q_ 




IE 




O 





n 



c3 



!>>0 

d o 
S a, 
o > 

o 






O ^ 




w 



512 



The New World 



Foreign 
privileges 



Foreigners 
in the 
treaty 
ports 



Chinese 
tariffs and 
transit 
dues 



Hungary also had concessions there which were surrendered by the 
terms of the treaties of Versailles (Germany) and St. Germain-en- 
Laye (Austria). 

At each treaty port is a tract called a "concession," where for- 
eigners reside and manage their own affairs. They levy taxes and 
special charges, build churches, and own warehouses, paying a land 
tax to the government. Foreigners enjoy equal rights, no matter 
what nation operates a given treaty port. Foreigners can also be 
tried in courts of their own at the treaty ports ; that is, there is extra- 
territorial jurisdiction. Cases between foreigners and Chinese are 
judged under the law of the defendant, who has freedom as to 
counsel and supervision. In Manchuria the foreigners live in so- 
called New Towns, built around the railway stations and subject 
to either Japanese or Russian administration. The ports of call 
differ from treaty ports in that foreigners cannot reside there or 
have business there, and all goods to and from ports of call must 
pass through a treaty port. 

The treaty ports present interesting features in respect of the dis- 
tribution of shipping and the relation between foreign and native 
population. We take for illustration the port of Tientsin, which 
ranks third among Chinese custom stations and is growing in im- 
portance. Of the trade in 1916, 39 per cent was under the Japanese 
flag, 33 per cent under the Chinese, 26 per cent under the British. 
Before the war Germany had 9 per cent. Of the total population of 
800,000, the Chinese numbered 750,000 in 1914, Japanese 1772, 
British 1530, Germans 753, Americans 542, French 294, Italians 93, 
Swiss 85, Danes 74, Austro-Hungarians 54, Norwegians 15, Portu- 
guese 6, Spanish 4. There was also a floating population of about 
60,000 coolies. 

Unfortunately, China had in vogue a system of municipal tariff 
and other transit exactions which subjected trade in China, whether 
foreign or domestic, to great embarrassment. But in 1842 it was 
arranged that a certain percentage added to the regular tariff of the 
treaty port would exempt goods from all other dues, no matter to 
what place in China they were sent. Many ports should be opened 
up if the vast interior spaces and the mineral and other resources are 
to be effectively developed. With the opening up of the interior 
should come a revision of the Chinese tariff and transit dues, now 
in a very complicated state. Some provinces allow goods to enter 
duty free (Mongoha) ; some have local rebates (Manchuria). 

The treaty port arrangements are, in general, restrictions upon 



The Far East 513 

Chinese sovereignty, and there has been a growing desire on the part China's ob- 
of the Chinese to discontinue these concessions or to modify them. Jhe^invasion 
Unless the Chinese carry through the reform projects aheady begun of her 
and give honest and reasonable administration, they will long con- 
tinue to suffer from the servitudes that are now imposed upon them 
in the use by foreigners of Chinese ports and other trading centers. 

The seizure of ports by rival powers was accompanied by the ac- 
quisition of tributary spheres of influence which in practice became 
commercial zones parceled out among British, German, French, Bel- 
gian, and Japanese merchants. Not having free ports or a sphere of 
influence, the United States carried on its Chinese trade under every 
form of handicap. This condition, coupled with the rivalries of the 
powers already established, was dangerous for aU ; but the vested 
interests had grown so enormous that for some years American in- 
sistence upon the Open Door pohcy had little efl'ect. 

A promising measure is the New Consortium, organized in 1919. Plan for 
It is composed of a group of banks and bankers from the United financSi"^ 
States, Great Britain, France, and Japan, formed as an international privileges 
partnership and at the request of their governments. Its object is | 

to finance the development of transportation systems, highways, 
and other basic enterprises by loans to the Chinese government. 
By these means, it is hoped to preserve the independence and terri- 
torial integrity of China and diminish international commercial rival- 
ries in the Far East. Future concessions by China and concessions 
already given upon which substantial progress has not yet been made, 
are to be pooled with the consortium so that the four banking groups 
already named may have an equal chance of participation. Japan 
sought to reserve parts of Manchuria and Mongolia from the scope 
of the consortium, but was finally induced to rehnquish these demands 
except with respect to certain branch-fine railway projects in southern 
Manchuria, the pofitical significance of which cannot be overesti- 
mated. The fuU importance of the consortium can only be realized 
if and when a sound constitutional government is formed in China. 
Such a thing does not at present exist. The northern and southern 
factions are still at war. The military governments of the provinces 
prefer disorder, and this caUs for heavy financial outlays. 

INTERNAL ADMINISTRATION 

In 1912 China became a republic, with a president instead of an 
emperor, but she is not yet in a settled state. Her interior regions, 
fike Yiinnan and Mongolia, always unruly because more remote 



514 



The New World 



Civil war 
in Cliina 



Courts of 
foreign or 
extra- 
territorial 
jurisdiction 



from the central government and composed of far more independent 
people, have not yet accepted the new order of things ; and between 
the democratic south and the more monarchicaUy inchned north there 
has been taking place a struggle fateful to the welfare of China. It 
is nominally a civil war, but really a contest between four factions 
for control of the Chinese people, their tax system, and their foreign 
policy. The group in control of Peking is recognized abroad as the 
de facto government. The present state of disorder recalls an earher 
period of revolution : the Taiping Rebellion of 1852-1864, in which 
most of eastern China was devastated, with the loss by war and 
famine of twenty milUons of people. Though China abohshed the 
feudal system several hundred years before the Christian era and 
concentrated her government at Peking, it was not an effective con- 
centration. Local self-government continued, and on the whole has 
been beneficial. But it has led also to local, not national, patriotism, 
owing to the ignorance of the mass of the people and the lack of 
modern means of communication. Such conditions favor the sepa- 
ratist policies of local leaders in periods of general disorder. Until 
a network of railways, wagon roads, and telegraph fines is built in 
China, there will not be developed that public spirit upon which 
national solidarity depends. 

In view of the bad state of the government of China, it is not sur- 
prising that its judicial system is both antiquated and corrupt, two 
qualities which have marked Chinese administration for hundreds of 
years. Therefore the powers, as soon as they had secured vested in- 
terests in China, obtained extraterritorial jurisdiction which enabled 
them to try criminal charges against their own citizens in special courts 
of their own appointment. To restore China to full sovereignty 
requires the abofition of these rights ; but the special courts can 
be dispensed with only if the Chinese codes of law and judicial pro- 
cedure are revised and simplified and honest judges are appointed. 

By the terms of the commercial treaty between the United States 
and China (1903) the United States undertook to assist China in 
revision of the legal code and agreed to relinquish extraterritorial 
rights when satisfied that a real change for the better had been made. 
China thereupon began such revision in 1904. Cruel and unjust 
punishments were abolished in 1905. Trained judges were appointed. 

In the past decade bureaus have been created m the fields of 
agriculture and commerce, postal service and education, police 
and constabulary, in an effort to centralize the authority of the gov- 
ernment and improve its civil service. The army has been drilled 



The Far East 



515 




125-300 [Z2 
over 300 

2Q 10 20 40 CO so lOOM 



Fig. 252. The density of population in China, by provinces. Note the position of Shantung 
and Korea and compare with Figure 244. Based, for China, on statistics in the Statesman's 
Year-Book. 

by foreign instructors, and the government has bought back some of 
the foreign raihoad and mining concessions. 

In proportion to her supply of important raw materials, China Possible 
has the smallest railway system and the largest labor supply of all commercial 
the nations Should she ever become industrialized, her industrial and 
commercial power would be incalculable. Like the United States, 
she has lands spread from the subtropical south to the temperate 
north, and in spite of her great population, in places dense, China 
has undeveloped territories capable of settlement, as in Mongoha 
and Manchuria. At least two thirds of her population of 400,000,000 
hve in a narrow belt relatively near the sea. Great rivers, valuable 
aUke for irrigation and for commerce, cross her fertile plains. She 
has ample natural harborage. 

The rivalry of the European powers in the field of Chinese trade Revision of 
is likely to continue unless it is arranged that all the commercial needed"^^ 
agreements between China and other countries shall be discussed openly 



516 



The New World 



and agreed to by all. In the past each power has pressed China for 
special customs privileges, as in the tariff on overland trade between 
China on the one hand and Russia, Great Britain, France, and 
Japan on the other. It is the judgment of leading statesmen that 
China's tariff should be revised, and that its regulation should 
be in Chinese hands and under the supervision, not of one power, but 
of all the powers. There was held in 1918 at Shanghai an inter- 
national conference which had for its object the standardizing of 
the customs rates, in order that a 5 per cent ad valorem duty might be 
charged, as provided by the treaties of 1902 between China and 
Great Britain and of 1903 between China and Japan and the United 
States, with the possibihty of a higher rate to increase the national 
revenues. 



II 



Russia for 
a time 
unable to 
defend her 
own inter- 
ests 



Railways as 
instru- 
ments of 
penetration 



THE STRUGGLE FOR MANCHURIA 

In eastern Asia the disposition of the former rights and privileges 
of Russia raises questions of large importance. She had gained rail- 
way privileges in Manchuria, and was fast developing her Amur prov- 
ince. In the struggle with Japan for possession of the indefinite zone 
between China and Russia, her people invested capital and made 
settlements. Until Russia finds herself again, the Allies are unwill- 
ing that her property should be turned over either to Japan or to 
China. The present administration of the region is divided between 
Japan and the RepubHc of Eastern Siberia (page 406). 

A problem fraught with danger to the peace of the Far East is the 
disposal and control of the railways of Manchuria, which have been 
powerful pohtical as well as economic instruments. They serve a 
region of great extent which has some of the best agricultural land in 
eastern Asia, besides iron mines and timbered tracts. The Chinese 
Eastern Railway, more than a thousand miles long, was under Rus- 
sian police authority until 1917, and Russia also had the right to 
exploit certain resources — for example, coal — along the line of 
railroad and in some districts outside the railroad strip as well. Rus- 
sia's claim to the exercise of poHce authority was based on the fact 
that the region is infested with armed robbers, and that her fine and 
equipment could not be safeguarded by Chinese police. 

Russia also built part of her trans-Siberian line across Manchm-ia, 
linking it with the Chinese Eastern Railway ; she thus extended her 
influence throughout northern Manchuria. She had planned to 
build southward, to Port Arthur and Dairen (formerly Dalny) ; thus 
Dairen would become the real ice-free port of eastern Siberia and 



Ji 



The Far East 517 

Vladivostok would become a naval base. By 1903, just before the 
outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War, Manchuria was practically 
under Russian control. Then came the war with Japan, and the 
Japanese entered southern Manchuria to the exclusion of the Rus- 
sians, at the same time adding Korea to their sphere of influence. 
This forced Russia to build her all-Russian line north of the Amur. 

During the period of active Russian expansion in northern Man- The 
churia, the Chinese Eastern Railway was nominally a private Russo- ES^rn 
Japanese corporation, although in reality it was a political instrument Railway the 
of Russia. Russia made Harbin the administrative center for the portant 
railroad. Harbin is naturally the economic center of northern 
Manchuria, and lies in the midst of the great wheat and soya bean 
region. Russian railroad officials have ruled Harbin and the raihoad 
strip as sovereigns, and the Japanese have copied every Russian 
invasion of Chinese rights in southern Manchuria on the South 
Manchuria Railway, over which Japan has control. 

Through her agreement with China, Japan has been able to exclude How 
other foreigners from railway enterprise in southern Manchuria. She i^j^M*^""' 
has secured control of blocks of territory along the Hue and also of the chuna 
naval base at Port Arthur and the commercial port of Dairen. The 
railway officials refuse cars to Chinese shippers and supply them to 
Japanese ; carry Japanese mail and refuse Chinese mail ; and give 
Japanese shippers rebates to guarantee successful competition. As 
the railway is policed by the Japanese, the Chinese cannot prevent 
trade privileges. Finally, the Japanese have used physical force 
in getting control of valuable properties, especicilly coal and timber 
land. They have increased their financial and political power in 
Manchuria by depreciating the value of Chinese copper money and by 
demoralizing the silver and paper currency market (Chinese currency 
is still on the silver basis). Japan has also obtained railway conces- 
sions elsewhere in China in regions of great economic value. In all 
this, Japan has been allowed by western powers to have a free hand. 

In 1910 Russia and China signed an agreement, ostensibly to re- 
store the sovereignty of northern Manchuria to China. But the agree- 
ment really left the railroad administration sovereign, at least in the 
cities and on the railroad line itself. The open door in Manchuria 
is therefore non-existent. Japan is growing stronger commercially 
throughout both the northern and the southern districts by the exer- 
cise of privileges wrested from China. The matter is the more serious 
because the region is an agricultural one capable of rapid 'and high de- 
velopment ; it is needed by China as an outlet for her dense popula- 



518 



The New World 



Problems of 

navigable 

rivers 



tion, and she has repeatedly but ineffectually tried to safeguard her 
rights. 

The Manchurian question is further complicated by the drainage 
lines. The middle Amur and Ussuri are boundary rivers, and the 
lower Amur is exclusively in Russian territory, while the Sungari is 
in Manchurian territory (Fig. 251). In 1910 China agreed to give 
Russia a privileged position on the Sungari for traffic between that 
river and ports on the Amur within the free zone of the boundary 
(50 versts, or 33.15 miles). Thus Chinese and Russian vessels have 
in actual practice exclusive trading privileges on the Sungari. 



The German 
sphere 



French 
sphere of 
influence 
in the 
south 




GERMANY IN SHANTUNG 

Like the other European powers, Germany sought a share in the 
land and trade of China. We have seen how she got a foothold (page 
496). Her control of the leased territory of Kiaochow was complete. 
The railway was protected by German guards and a German postal 
service was established. It appeared that Germany was bent upon 
a policy similar to that which Russia was pursuing in Manchuria 
or the French in Yiinnan. Germans also undertook a system of 
afforestation, controlled floods, and built macadamized roads, forts, 

modern harbor works, and a scien- 
tifically planned city. Schools 
were established. German officials 
cultivated the Chinese and, on the 
whole, maintained agreeable re- 
lations with them; nor were any 
attempts made to colonize Shan- 
tung by German immigrants. 

THE FRENCH IN CHINA 

French interests, apart from 
treaty ports and mineral and rail- 
way concessions, are centered in 
southern China. In 1885 France 
forced China to give up entirely 
her sovereignty over Annam, and 
agreements were made with China 
for the regulation of the trade be- 
tween Chinese southern provinces 

FiQ. 253. French and British spheres of influ- i m i • i i i i« 

ence in Siam, a buffer state. and TonklU, whcreb^ gOOds flOm 



SI AM 

Present boundary 

Former boundaries 

„.. Spheres of influence 

(since Jan. 15, I89G) - 



The Far East 519 

Tonkin enjoyed a reduction in tariff rates. By the convention of 
1895, France also obtained special privileges for railways in southern 
Chinese territory. There was thus in southern China a railway 
penetration under French guidance comparable in its objects, although 
not in its methods, to that of Russia in Manchuria. The poUcy of 
the French in the management of their principal railway in Yunnan 
(completed in 1910) was to secure a monopoly of the trade of the 
region and to close the door to other European and to American 
trade. 



CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO 



Significance 
of the sea 
route to 
India 



Trade focus 
in south- 
eastern 
Asia 



Changes in 

political 

geography 



THE PACIFIC REALM AND AUSTRALIA 

The wealth of India, the Far East, and the East Indies was known 
to Europeans several centuries before the all-sea route thither had 
been pioneered by Vasco da Gama from the west and by Magellan 
from the east. But its control could not pass into European hands 
until the sea route was discovered ; for the land routes were too long 
and difficult from the physiographic standpoint and they were beset 
by incurable disorders. Illuminating in this respect is the early 
abandonment of the Red Sea route (which was taken by CoviDiam 
in 1487 on his way to India), though it involved the crossing of so 
small a strip of land as the Isthmus of Suez. The physical geography 
of Asia helped its native peoples to exclude the rest of the world until 
time had worked a mighty change and the European became indomi- 
table upon the sea. 

Once the key to Asiatic trade conquest had been discovered, west- 
ern merchants were swift to extend their range of power. Covilham 
and Vasco da Gama were soon followed by other Portuguese ex- 
plorers, who pushed eastward and northward as far as Japan (Pinto, 
1543). The Dutch were close behind them. Spain, with the Philip- 
pines as her chief center of trade, maintained a galleon service with 
Mexico. Japan and China were closed empires. The focus of ac- 
tivity was southeastern Asia. Long after their discovery Australia 
and New Zealand were counted as of no value, and the mazes of is- 
lands and archipelagos of the vast outer Pacific were on the whole 
regarded as mere stations for supplying food and water to the mariner. 

As in our day, the subsequent chapters in the political geography 
of the Pacific are closely related to the general European conditions 
of diplomacy and war, and for our present purpose need not be de- 
tailed. The vast Portuguese possessions shrank to mere footholds, 
as at Macao in southern China, and at Goa and elsewhere in India. 
The Dutch, though ejected from South Africa, held a large part of 
the East Indies. Spain's sphere in the Pacific was static. Russia, 
as a result chiefly of Bering's expedition, broke over the northern 
edge of the Pacific and planted her flag in Alaska ; but Siberia was too 
distant and extensive and Russian commercial organization too prim- 
itive to permit effective penetration of the field of eastern trade until 
the modern period of overland rail exploitation in northern China. 

It was the English who won supremacy in naval power in the early 

520 






The Pacific Realm and Australia 



521 




Fig. 254. The political map of the Pacific in 1914. All of Germany's possessions north of the 
equator have now been assigned to Japan as the mandatory power of the League of Nations ; 
and those south of the equator were similarly assigned to Great Britain, to Australia, or to New 
Zealand, including the island of Nauru immediately south of the equator. On account of its 
nearness to the Philippines and its value as a cable station, the island of Yap has been of par- 
ticular interest to the United States, though Japan claims it by virtue of the treaty of 1916 
with Great Britain (page 522). 

colonial period and, with shrewd foresight, backed up their great unequal 
chartered trading companies that were for long thereafter the pioneers ^"n°J.Sron 
of empire. India is Great Britain's chief prize, but the power of 
her merchants is felt in every port of the vast trade realm of the Far 
East and the Pacific. France came into the region hesitatingly and 
won only fragments here and there until the second half of the 19th 
century, when she seized Indo-China. Germany came later and got 
less, being restricted in the Pacific to relatively poor and widely spaced 
island possessions; and she had no hold at all in densely populated 
Malaysia. The United States, though winning rights in Samoa 



522 



The New World 



Belated 
advance of 
Japan and 
America 



(Pagopago) as early as 1839, did not obtain tangible authority there 
until 1889. Hawaii in 1898 and the Philippines and Guam later in 
the same year were the succeeding steps in a belated advance. 

Throughout the first half of the 19th century the large European 
nations, in the full tide of industrial organization, sought eagerly 
for overseas markets, in the Pacific and the Far East as elsewhere. 
It is significant that during this period neither the United States 
nor Japan, the two strongest powers bordering the Pacific, par- 
ticipated in the division of territory. The United States, so lately 
expanded westward, had cheap land and a multitude of domestic 
enterprises that absorbed her energies and capital; and she sought 
extension of power on the sea only when foreign trade was needed 
to supplement domestic resources. Japan, who kept her ports closed 
to European trade until 1854, pursued a strictly provincial policy 
with respect to additional territory. Her interest in the Pacific, 
once aroused, was long restricted to the consoHdation of island hold- 
ings off the eastern Asiatic mainland, until the whole archipelago 
between Formosa and the Kurile islands, with an extent of 3000 miles, 
was in her hands. Thereafter she looked toward the mainland and 
its readily exploitable people and wealth rather than toward the outer 
and poorer Pacific islands. 

With the spread of Japanese settlers to the Phifippines and Hawaii 
and the phenomenally rapid growth of her overseas commerce, partic- 
ularly during the World War, Japan sought every possible territorial 
advantage. By agreement with Great Britain in 1916 she was to 
obtain all of Germany's islands north of the equator, and Great Britain 
all of those south of the equator, in the event of Germany's defeat. 
This agreement, confirmed subsequently to the treaty of Versailles, 
places Japan in a wholly new relation to the western powers. 



Defense of 
American 
posses- 
sions in 
the Pacific 



EXTENSION OF JAPANESE POWER IN THE PACIFIC 

Japan's position in the middle of the Pacific, where her capture 
of the Marshall and Caroline Islands (1914) has placed her, is of great 
concern to the naval strategists of the United States. In earlier 
years the defense of American territory in the Pacific was related to 
the idea of the so-called American quadrilateral. As Figure '^65 
shows, this consists of four possessions, widely spaced : Dutch Harbor 
in the Aleutian Islands, Alaska ; Guam, 1520 miles east of the Philip- 
pines ; Hawaii, 2100 miles southwest of San Francisco ; and Samoa, 
1600 miles northeast of New Zealand. American concern for the 
means of naval protection in the Pacific first manifested itself about 



The Pacific Realm and Australia 



523 




Fig. 255. Distances and positions of critical interest in the American scheme of naval defense 

in the Pacific. 

fifty years ago, when part of Samoa became an American responsi- 
bility. There were added the Phihppines and Guam in 1898, and the 
Panama Canal Zone in 1903. These possessions cannot be protected 
adequately save by holding forward bases in the Pacific. 

From San Juan, Porto Rico, to Manila, in the Philippines, is al- 
most halfway around the world. To defend these widely separated 
areas will require a great fleet of warships, powerful squadrons of 
seaplanes, abundant coaling and cable facilities, and large and power- 
ful radio stations at strategic points. 

Into the midst of this area Japan has now thrust a long finger, 
and no sooner did she capture the Marshall and Caroline Islands and 
turn out the German authorities than she set to work to Japanize the 
towns and local industries and increase the defensive strength of the 



5M 



The New World 



Japanese 
as tropical 
colonizers 



Trade 
values 



Islands as 
points of 
connection 



Strategic points. As the mandatory power under the League of Na- 
tions, Japan will be expected to observe certain conditions : the islands 
should remain unfortified, their people should have some measure of 
autonomous goverimient, the rights of other nations should be pro- 
tected, and there should be a reasonable approach to equahty of 
trade opportunity. 

Were the control of the Pacific a matter of strategy only, the Jap- 
anese intrusion might arouse httle concern. But, unfike the European 
powers who hold their possessions for trade or native development 
of agriculture, the Japanese are themselves tropica colonizers. They 
form half the population of Hawaii and are spreading into the Philip- 
pines. But for exclusion aws they would figure more largely in the 
population of northern Australia. Their ethnic penetration of the 
lands of other powers is favored by their manner of living and the 
prime necessity of the white planter in the tropics of securing ac- 
chmated labor. Such penetration will inevitably be followed sym- 
pathetically by the home government and made the basis for claims 
of equality of treatment and, in case of successful war, for territorial 
control. 

Figure 254, with text, shows the status of the Pacific islands. As 
conmiercial assets, the islands outside of the East Indies and the 
PhiHppines have only moderate value. The total trade of the princi- 
pal groups in 1913 amounted to $40,000,000. The islands assigned 
to Japan, by agreement with Great Britain, have a total population 
of 70,000; their foreign trade amounts to $2,500,000 and consists 
chiefly of the export of copra and phosphates. They are of great 
strategical importance. 

As coaling and cable stations, islands are important if placed near 
or on the direct steamship routes. The United States, for example, is 
interested in its small scattered holdings as they assist communica- 
tion between Hawaii and the PhiHppines. The Pacific cable of the 
Commercial Cable Company runs from Hawaii to a relay station at 
Midway, and to Yap in the Palau group. From Yap an American- 
British fine "extends northward to the Bonin Islands, where it con- 
nects with the Japanese fine to Tokio. There is also a connection 
at Yap with British lines to the Chinese coast, and the American 
cable extending to Manila has connections with New Guinea and with 
Menado in the northern Celebes. 

Islands have also gained in importance because of the use of air- 
planes and hydroplanes in modern warfare. The innumerable islets 
and protected inland waterways that abound in the Pacific furnish 



The Pacific Realm and Australia 



5^5 



ideal hiding places for submarines, and it is unthinkable that the use 
of submarines should be permitted on the long highways of commerce 
that criss-cross the Pacific. 

If these considerations affect American opinion, how much more 
seriously will they be taken by the small nation of Austraha with 
one twentieth the population ! The Austrahan leaders have not always 
found British statesmen in sympathy with them, and they claim 
that breadth of view regarding the Japanese question is possible only 
in proportion as one is geograpliically removed from the menace of 
immigration. Let us see what special aspects the problem wears in 
the white man's lands of the southern Pacific. 

THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA 

There are two British possessions — Australia and the Union Racial 
of South Africa — in which the political problems of the time de- orAus™^ 
pend not so much upon the physical setting of the race as upon traUa 
public opinion with respect to the exclusion of other races. In South 
Africa, the problem is to keep the black within the limits of the broad 
coastal zone where the climatic conditions are more favorable to him 
than to the whites; in Australia, the problem is to keep out the 
Malays, the natives of India, the Chinese, and the Japanese. In 




Fig. 256. Population map of the world. Each dot represents 500,000 persons. In Australia 
the white man found a habitable and an almost empty continent. Distance is measured in time 
as well as in miles, and modern transportation has shortened the time of ocean journeys. Once 
two months apart, Australia and India are now ten days apart, and the same is true of Australia 
and China or Japan. The migration of colored labor from temperate and subtropical India, 
China, and Japan to temperate and subtropical Australia has raised the question of race exclusion 
to the rank of an international problem. From Finch and Baker, Atlas of American Agriculture, 
\917. 



526 



The New World 



Australian 
view of 
Japanese 
expansion 
toward the 
south 



Effect of 
geographi- 
cal condi- 
tions in 
Australia 




n 



both cases there is a very frank 
avowal of the desire of the wliite 
settlers of Eui'opean stock to 
possess the land as a heritage 
for their children. 

Up to the present the people 
of Australia have consistently 
followed out their restrictive 
policy. About 98 per cent of 
Australia is occupied by per- 
sons of British stock or their 
descendants born in the com- 
monwealth. There is no prob- 
lem of foreigners entrenched 
in the country, as in the French 
Canadian district of Quebec 
and in the Boer colonies of 
South Africa. The number of 
full-blooded Asiatics is very 
small, probably not more than 
35,000 to 40,000, with the 
Chinese in the majority. 
That Japan should have come into possession of the naval station 
at Jaluit in the Marshall Islands has been a source of great anxiety 
to Australia and New Zealand on the one hand and to the United 
States on the other. For the station is almost equidistant from 
Japan, New Zealand, and the nearest large port of Austraha. It 
is about 2100 miles from Honolulu, 3500 miles from Hongkong, and 
4000 miles from San Francisco. Japan has come 2000 miles nearer 
Australasia. It is the fear of the Austrahans that tliis approach 
means the beginning of an invasion of the warmer lands of the 
Pacific, whence the Japanese w ould exert a stronger pressure upon the 
govermnents of New Zealand and Austraha to be allowed to compete 
in labor fields on equal terms with the whites. 

We shall do well to look for a moment at the internal problems 
of Australia, because they have some important international im- 
plications. This leads us first to consider the extraordinary phys- 
ical setting of the continent. The eastern portion is mountainous 
and receives rainfall from the southeastern trade winds. All the rest 
of the country is desert, save for a small district in the southwestern 
corner which has winter rains sufficient to give it better resources, 



Fig. 257. The heavy line encloses the area peo- 
pled by the yellow race in the tropics. It has 
settled exclusively in regions recei\'ing over 50 inches 
of rain per annum (shaded area). A similar climate 
prevails in only the northern part of Australia. 



The Pacific Realm and Australia 



527 




Fig. 258, Sugar plantation in North Queensland. For a contrast 
to this tropical scene see Figure 259. 




;;*;- ^.• 



Fig. 25'J. Wlieat liarvest in southeastern Australia. 



528 



The New World 




Distribution 

of 

population 



Attitude of 
the com- 
monwealth 
toward 
Asiatic 
immigra- 
tion 



and a strip on the 
north coast which falls 
within the hmits of the 
equatorial rains during 
the southern summer. 

In fact, the land of 
Australia would be far 
less valuable than it 
is if it were not for 
the great artesian belt, 
which permits the pas- 
turage of stock far from 
the region of perpetual 
streams (Fig. 260). Dry 
farming has also helped 

Fig. 260. The probable and known artesian areas in Australia '' 

are shaded. The heavy solid lines represent grades of rainfall dcr of the productivC 

in inches. Where there is less than ten inches annually and "u Ij. i? • i ^ 

no artesian water, grazing is limited and there are no towns, neit laT Uliana. 

except where mines have been developed, as at Coolgardie and Xhc DODulation is 

Kalgoorlie, 350 miles east of Perth. From official Auslralian i • 

Year-Book, 1919. disposcd lu a manner 

to correspond with the 
rain belts (Fig. 262). Nearly half of Australia is miinhabited. Only 
1 per cent of the total area is under cultivation. Fewer than 5000 
people live in an interior area larger than all of the United States 
west of the longitude of Denver. Though Australia is as large as 
continental United States without Alaska, the population numbers only 
5,000,000, and the average density is less than 2 to the square mile, 
if we include the whole area. In the more densely settled portions 
in the southeast and southwest the density is from 8 to 16 or more 
inhabitants to the square mile. In a belt of country 100 miles wide 
along the eastern, southern, and southwestern coast live 80 per cent 
of the people. The population tends to become urban to an increas- 
ing degree, 40 per cent of the total hving in the six principal cities, 

-In 1901 the Austrahan Commonwealth came into existence. The 
separate states have much larger rights as contrasted with the cen- 
tral government than is the case in the United States. Wliile the 
central or commonwealth government controls immigration, each 
state can confront the immigrant with prohibitive regulations that 
greatly hamper him, if they do not exclude him. The different 
states have different tests of eligibility for the enjoyment of the ordi- 
nary rights of a citizen to hold whatever property or engage in what- 



The Pacific Realm and Australia 



529 




Hebrides 



Fig. 261. View of the harbor of Port Jackson, Sydney, Australia. This is one of the chief 
points of naval defense in the Pacific and one of the finest natural harbors in the world. 

ever occupation he chooses. The Labor Party is in practical control 
of the government of the Commonwealth, a circumstance which 
has aggravated immigration difficulties, by reason of the fact that 
the labor unions steadily oppose the introduction of Chinese, Japa- 
nese, and Indian labor. 

Two island groups that lie relatively close to her northeastern coast — The New 
the New Hebrides and New Caledonia — are of special interest to 
Australia. Following the Anglo-French convention of 1906, France 
and Great Britain exercise control of the New Hebrides through a 
condominium and a joint court. This procedure has not proved to 
be a success ; it invites delay and does not give the native justice, 
though it has regulated the recruitment of the native population by 
labor contractors. Two thirds of the area of the New Hebrides, and 
the best islands, are in French possession. 

Related to the problem of the New Hebrides is that of New Cale- 
donia, which is an isolated possession of France, long used as a convict 
colony. Strategically it is important because it hes near AustraHa — 
in fact, too near for comfort. The commercial value of the group, 
which supplies nickel, cobalt, and chrome to French industry, depends 
in less degree upon the immediate products than upon the relation to 
the trade of Austraha and the East Indies, and France is keenly aware 
of this relation. 



New Cale- 
donia 



530 



The New World 



NEW ZEALAND AND THE SAMOAN MANDATE 



Western 
Samoa 
to be ad- 
ministered 
by New 
Zealand 



Apportion- 
ment of the 
phosphate 
of Nauru 




Western Samoa* 
which before the World 
War belonged to Ger- 
many, consists of the 
islands of Savaii and 
Upolu, and these have 
been assigned to New 
Zealand for administra- 
tion under a mandate 
of the League of Na- 
tions (1919). For a 
period of a year this 
mandate was to be tem- 
porary in character, and 
it will probably be made 
permanent in 1921. 



Fig. 262. Australia extends almost from 10° S. to 40° S. To There are Undertakings 
develop the northern (hot) region a low-grade labor supply is 
needed. But the Australian people wish to keep the continent 
as an inheritance of the white race. Japanese, Indian, and 
Malay exclusion has brought into being grave international 
questions. The northern part is tropical, the southern tem- 
perate. AH the foci of population are on the coast. The ini- 
tials represent cities which are spelled in full in Figure 260. 
From official Australian Year-Book, 1919. 



on the part of New 
Zealand to prohibit the 
slave trade and forced 
labor, except as the 
latter is necessary for 
public works and services. Traffic in arms and ammunition is to 
be controlled, and the importation or manufacture of intoxicating 
spirits for natives of the territory is prohibited. No mihtary or 
naval works are to be constructed. In Samoa, New Zealand faces at 
once the problem of imported labor hitherto derived from China and 
the Solomon Islands. 

New Zealand also laid claim to the island of Nauru, just south of 
the equator in longitude 167°, on the ground that its rich phosphate 
deposits were essential to the agriculture of New Zealand. The 
Australian government also having requested possession of the island 
or a mandate for it, the mandate was finally given to the British gov- 
ernment, and a subsequent agreement was made by which the United 
Kingdom, Austraha, and New Zealand divide the output of the phos- 
phate works. The United Kingdom and Austraha are each to receive 
42 per cent of the output, and New Zealand the remaining 16 per cent. 
The island is estimated to contain a phosphate reserve of 42,000,000 
tons, enough to last for 200 years at the present rate of production. 



The Pacific Realm and Australia 



531 



New Zealand has created a department of external affairs to immigra- 
take over the responsibility for the Samoan mandate and to handle J|°n^®^' 
other external questions, such as the administration of the Cook New 
Islands and regulations as to immigration. The immigration prob- 
lem has two phases, the first relating to the exclusion of undesirables, 
especially Asiatics, while the second has to do with the encourage- 
ment of immigrants who would make desirable citizens. With an area 
of more than 100,000 square miles New Zealand has a population 
of only a little more than 1,000,000, or an average density of about 
10 to the square mile. The encouragement of white immigration 
would therefore greatly increase the future wealth of the country. 

New Zealand has a labor problem in her Pacific possessions that bids 
fair to be of international concern. By the terms of the Labor Con- 
vention included in the peace treaties of Paris (1919-1920), the con- 
ditions of labor and the treatment of natives are made matters of 
international interest within the scope of the League of Nations. 

Like many of the local groups elsewhere, the people of the Fiji Islands Labor 
(a Crown Colony) have talked of the equality of races until they have piji^ ^™ ^ 
worked themselves into a belligerent mood that has resulted in 
serious disorder, and even in loss of fife. The trouble arose because 
of a strike of East Indians, and almost all the people of this race in 
Fiji (about 60,000 in number, estimated at 37 per cent of the popula- 
tion) were concerned. The Indians demanded equal rights with the 
whites, declaring themselves to be as good as the whites. Matters 
reached a cUmax in February 1920, when it was necessary to put 
down the disturbance by the use of mihtary forces. The men were 
chiefly employed in the sugar fields of the Rewa River. At one time 
there were 30,000 striking cooUes outside the capital, Suva. 



CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE 



AFRICAN COLONIES OF THE EUROPEAN POWERS 



Colonial 
expansion 
in Africa 
a struggle 
for raw 
materials 



Colored 
peoples 
called to 
fight a 
white 
man's war 



Growing 
•• self- 
conscious- 
ness " of 
the African 
races 



Portions of 
the African 
world still 
loyal to 
European 
powers 



In Africa the colonial rivalries of European powers had developed 
their most intense phases. Every statesman and economist sees in 
the wealth of labor supply that the continent affords and in its enor- 
mous and still rapidly expanding volume of raw mater'als — fibers, oils, 
hides, minerals, rubber — sources of industrial and political power of 
great importance to enterprising nations of the north temperate zone. 
Indeed, some students find in this struggle for raw materials, rather 
than in rivalries in the Balkans and Asia Minor, the basic cause of the 
World War. The two latter regions, it is thought, are of immediate 
interest only as transit lands that must be crossed to reach the markets 
of more distant places — India and the Far East. 

As far as serious poHtico-geographical questions arose respecting 
Africa, they were between European nations up to 1914, for Liberia 
and Abyssinia are the only independent divisions of African territory. 
But the World War has added a new aspect. Fearful of losing that 
civiUzation wliich it had taken centuries to create, each of the western 
powers, in the stress of war, called to its aid every nation tributary 
to it, even though small and weak. To assure loyalty, the tributary 
peoples were given exceptional privileges, which they later translated 
into terms of independence. Having paid in blood and treasure for 
the reaUzation of democratic principles, they themselves sought to 
win the full measure of democratic liberty. 

Finally, the idea of "self-determination" was added to the prob- 
lem. Every group, however small, worked out an independent 
program. Nationalism was intensified; where it had not hitherto 
existed it was created. The effect in Africa has been to call into 
question everywhere the right of the European to rule. Revolts have 
occurred in Portuguese East Africa, in Libya (Itahan), and in Egypt 
(British), and an aheady dangerous feeUng has been intensified among 
5,000,000 South African blacks. 

Fortunately for the peace of the world, large portions of Africa 
have remained loyal in spite of the desire of their peoples for a larger 
measure of independence. Morocco sent thousands of soldiers to 
help France. Algeria and Tunis were quiet during the war at least. 
The 10,000,000 natives within the Belgian Congo were loyal to Bel- 
gium and assisted her with a powerful colonial army which took part 
in the conquest of German East Africa (now Tanganyika Terri- 

532 



African Colonies of the European Powers 533 

tory). Uganda and British East Africa (now Kenya Colony), Nyasa- 
land, Nortliern Rhodesia, Gambia, Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, and 
Nigeria remained loyal members of the British Empire, and con- 
tributed decisively to the conquest of German East Africa, Togoland, 
and the Cameroons. 

THE PROBLEMS OF RACE AND RELIGION 

The relations of African peoples to Europeans are governed in large Races and 
part by certain outstanding racial, social, and rehgious tendencies, ^'t^resof 
Let us look for a moment at the ethnographic background of the 
problem. Africa was invaded from Asia, by way of Egypt and the 
Arabian coast, at a time when an indigenous African culture could 
scarcely be said to exist. Successive waves of population spread west 
and south into every part of the land many thousands of years be- 
fore the last period of intense white exploration in the middle of the 
19th century. Distinct racial, linguistic, and cultural traits were 
developed, in some respects adapted to the geographical environment, 
in other respects a reflection of earher racial history. The low culture 
of the agricultural negro in the hot, moist, forested realm of the cen- 
tral part of the continent contrasted with the high civilization de- 
veloped by the Nilotic peoples on the northeast. The Berber, and 
later the Arab, spread over the northern desert (Sahara) and had a 
type of hfe unlike that of either the forest negro or the Nile farmer. 
In part sedentary oasis dwellers, both Berber and Arab were also in 
part nomadic — men of desert trails, watering places, and temporary 
pastures, and given to a free life. 

Under Mohanunedan influence, the Arab, fiercely fanatical and 
seeking the conquest of Christian peoples, came into Egypt ; thence 
he spread across northern Africa, and into the Sudan. This was in 
the 7th and 8th centuries and represents one of the most important 
migrations of history. It was followed, centuries later, by the invasion 
of Spain and prolonged Moorish control, not completely broken until 
the fall of Granada in 1492. An earher stream of Arab migration had 
flowed down the eastern coast of Africa, to Zanzibar and Mozambique. 
With the rise of Mohammedanism these Arab outposts in eastern 
Africa accepted the new rehgion, but they never became fanatical, 
owing probably to their political independence and to the remote and 
isolated positions they held. Though conquered locally, the Arab 
has been at all times a restless element. 

The negroes form the most numerous race in Africa. They num- The black 
ber (with the Bantus) about 120,000,000 persons, or four fifths of the pop^a^oos 



534 



The New World 



Moslem in- 
fluence 
among the 
blacks 



The Zam- 
besi the 
southern 
limit of 
Islam 



total black population of the globe, the remaining 30,000,000 living 
for the most part in Australasia and in America. Though occupying 
the least desirable parts of Africa, where insects, malaria, and heavy 
forests made white conquest long impossible (it is still extremely 
difficult), the negro has multiphed and has developed great resistance 
to endemic diseases and the effects of tropical sunhght. His tribal 
organization is in some places extremely primitive, in other places well 
systematized; but group development has been nowhere carried to 
the point where it broke through the barriers of geographical posi- 
tion and environment to make the black a conqueror. In fact, the 
pure-blooded negro never exercised any self-originating political in- 
fluence over other races. His is a plastic and imitative temperament. 
As one writer has put it : he has never founded a stone city, or built a 
ship, or produced a literature, or suggested a creed. 

The white and the brown peoples have long competed for pohtical 
and religious control of the blacks of Africa. Arab penetration was 
centuries ahead of the white conquests that followed the Age of Dis- 
covery (15th and 16th centuries). Had that age been long delayed, 
the growth of Mohammedanism would have put the combined Arab 
and Turkish worlds in possession of a vast and exceedingly dangerous 
reservoir of man power. For "Islamism brought with it, almost 
without fail, political organization, a certain amount of civihzation, 
commercial activity, and the establishment of slavery as an institu- 
tion." The defeat of the Moor (Moslem Arab and Berber) in 
Spain late in the 15 th century and of the Turk in southwestern Europe 
in the 17th century, and thereafter the steady waning of the Turkish 
Empire, was succeeded in Africa during the 18th century by gradual 
possession, on the part of western nations, of strategic coastal lo- 
calities. There followed in the 19th century trade development, the 
rapid increase of missionary activity, and the partition of Africa. 

The growth of Islam is far more rapid than that of Christianity 
among the negroes and wiU tend to increase their warlike tendencies. 
It may eventually bring the negro into conflict with the white man 
for possession of the continent. It has spread chiefly among the 
blacks of the Sudan, where there is intimate contact with the desert 
centers of religious influence, particularly the fanatical Moslem sects 
hke the Senussi (page 57). Islam is stifl virtually unknown among the 
natives south of the Zambesi. The white man there dreads its ap- 
pearance, fearing its effect upon the entire social and political 
organization. 

The contest in Africa between white- skinned Christian and brown 



African Colonies of the European Powers 535 

Moslem populations reaches its climax in the northern zone of the The con- 
continent — the Sahara and, more important, the northern coastal ^^l^^l^_ 
belt. The Moors, when expelled from Spain late in the 15th century, lam and 
retired to Morocco, where they more firmly estabhshed the principle tianiti in 
of Moslem opposition to Christian advance. Under the ardent teach- northern 
ing of Turkish agents from Constantinople and elsewhere, the Egyptian 
nationahst movement, with strong religious aspects, has combined 
with other forces to threaten perpetual disorder. The scattered oases 
of the Sahara are the homes of unruly people. Great Britain has had 
to send yearly mihtary expeditions against some of the tribesmen of 
the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. France is faced by local but nearly con- 
tinuous disorder in Morocco, Tunis, and Algeria, and on the desert edge 
of French Equatorial Africa. Only as a result of costly miUtary expe- 
ditions was it possible, a generation ago, to break up the Arab mili- 
tary organizations of the Belgian Congo and of the Lake Nyasa region. 

The rivalries of unhke peoples and cultures (not rehgions) are equally south 
acute and even more dangerous in South Africa, where the white man ff"^^^® 
is greatly outmmibered. The blacks have given incessant trouble, intense 
which has been augmented in later years by the growing ambitions 
of the Indian population, first introduced to work on the eastern 
coastal plantations. But for the segregation of blacks largely on the 
eastern margin of South Africa and the fairly rapid spread of the 
whites to the mines and pastures of the central and southwestern 
portions, where a cooler climate prevails. South Africa would never 
have been won as a white man's country, or if won would have been 
quickly lost, as far as effective settlement is concerned. 

One of the effects of the political occupation of Africa by European Effect of 
nations has been a more rapid increase of native population, al- mans 
ready so large as to threaten white supremacy. It is asserted that ^o^pon 
the population of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan dropped from 8,000,000 the colored 
to 1,800,000 through massacre and famine during the period (1870- ^^ 
1896) of disorder inomediately before British conquest and occupation. 
The creation of great irrigation works and of a famine rehef service 
has greatly increased the population of India. The same effect 
of white control is witnessed in Jamaica and Barbados. The stop- 
ping of tribal wars has of course greatly diminished the death rate 
in both India and Africa. In some of the native reservatoins in 
South Africa tribes have increased several hundred per cent in fifty 
or sixty years. 

The effect of European penetration in Africa, no less than in other 
regions where primitive races have been brought under the control of 



536 



The New World 



the wliite man, is marked by an almost complete derangement of 
indigenous social and political structures. With their strongly devel- 
oped tendency to introduce changes, with their incessant pohtical 
activity and its rapid imposition of new forms of government and 
society on native races, the Europeans brought what amounted to a 
revolution in the way of hfe of every people with whom they came 
in contact. Native society in many instances has disintegrated before 
the European advance, and the problem of local self-government is 
in many cases one of adapting native forms to modern conditions with- 
out destroying the native sense of organization and responsibihty. 



Cool 

grassy up- 
lands of 
central 
Africa 



THE WHITE MAN S LANDS IN TROPICAL AFRICA 

Though white settlements are scattered about the margins of the 
continent and in strategic trade centers in the interior, they are at 
present grouped in an effective way in only two belts of hmited extent — 
a northern and a southern. Along the sea border in Egypt, Libya, 
Morocco, Algeria, and Tunis, nearly 1,000,000 wliites have settled; 
and there are 1,500,000 whites of Dutch and British blood in South 
Africa. These two extremities of the continent were long thought 
to be the only lands capable of white colonization. 

What are the possibiUties of wliite settlement elsewhere.^ The 
striking feature of the topography of central Africa is the extent of 
large uplands where the white man can hve and work, as shown on 
Figure 263. These are now in process of being tied to the ocean by 
trade routes and railroads that penetrate from Egypt, from former 
German East Africa, and from the Union of South Africa. Long 
removed from the political control of the whites, the interior highland 
mass now invites people of white blood not only through its cUmate but 
by its products, and from the fact that it borders the densely popu- 
lated districts which produce valuable raw materials. 

It should not be thought that the shaded portions of Figure 263 
represent the limits of white occupation in the area within the scope 
of the map. Many lower tracts have nuclei of white settlement here 
and there. Some of the elevated tracts cannot be effectively occu- 
pied until bordering regions through which they are reached are sup- 
pHed with roads and railways and cleared of tropical diseases. Not all 
uplands are free of malaria, and the effects of such climatic character- 
istics as the great diurnal and slight seasonal variations of temperature 
remain to be seen before white colonization can be proved truly 
successful. Finally, there is toward the south a progressively cooler 
climate, so that not merely the most elevated districts but the whole 



African Colonies of the European Powers 



537 




Fig. 263. The shaded areas represent districts with an elevation above or near 5000 feet and 
with relatively cool climate. They are the "white man's lands" of central Africa. However, 
white settlement on the uplands will depend not only upon altitude but also upon accessibility 
to railroads and the sea, the nervous effects of living at abnormally high elevations, the amount 
and seasonal distribution of rainfall, and the quality and amount of native labor. From 3000 to 
5000 feet elevation the country is still possible for whites for prolonged periods. Below 3000 
feet white men cannot long retain normal vigor and are subject to serious tropical ailments. 
Toward the south increasing latitude makes the upland country of Rhodesia habitable for whites 
at lower elevations. Compiled from the British General Staff sheets, scale 1 : 2,000,000, 1919. 



upland becomes available for white occupation, as in most of PUio- 
desia, where Salisbury is located — a modern town, the center of an 
extensive grazing and mining region. 

It is not, however, the region of cooler climate but rather the trop- valuable 

. • f» 1 1 products 

ical lowland portions of Africa that furnish the kinds of goods that of tropical 
the countries of the temperate zone most require for their industries, ^""^^ 
particularly the European countries which lie much farther north 
than the United States. It was in Afrca that Germany wished to 
secure large areas suitable for the production of coffee, cotton, cacao, 
rubber, palm oil, cane sugar, bananas, tobacco, besides minerals of 
•which she had little, such as petroleum, tin, gold, and copper. The 
United States grows cotton at home, in the southern states and many 
other subtropical products she gets close by — in the West Indies, 
Central America, and northern South America. European countries 
must get these materials from abroad, and of course they would prefer 
to get them from their own colonies, where they can make trade 



538 



The New World 



Control of 
germ dis- 
eases and 
insect 
pests 



arrangements favorable to themselves. This explains why they were 
all eager to share in the partition of Africa. In spite of the fact 
that scarcely any one of the tropical colonies has paid its own way, 
it was hoped that in time they would become profitable, and until 
then, at least they furnished commodities that were vital to many 
industries. 

The most serious enviroimiental problems of the future colonists 
of tropical Africa are the germ diseases and the insect pests. Figure 
265 shows the areas affected by sleeping sickness, which is perhaps 
one of the greatest restrictions upon development. This disease, 
which is transmitted by the tsetse fly, has its worst aspects in jungle- 
covered areas about the borders of rivers, lakes, and swamps. Only 
better drainage and the clearing away of native bushy or jungle 



D 
POPU 




Fig. 264. The Uganda region of central Africa. Note the importance of a dense native popu- 
lation near a large lake and a belt of "white man's lands" still undeveloped. Based on Sir Harry 
Johnston, The Uganda Protectorate, Vol. II, 1904, 2d ed. 



African Colonies of the European Powers 



539 




Fig. 265. Distribution of known sleeping sickness districts and localities in Central Africa. 
Compare with map of belts of vegetation, Figure 270. After map from Sleeping Sickness Bu- 
reau, London, 1909. 

growth will enable the white man to hve safely or to keep cattle. 
Rinderpest further limits the grazing industry. Cholera and the 
bubonic plague recur in the low, hot, dirty, and humid coast ports. 
Tropical Africa is rich, and it can be won by the white man ; but it 
will be won only after a long struggle by white settlers in cooperation 
with physicians trained in tropical medicine, and by governments 
intelhgent enough to help the pioneer. 



THE PENETRATION OF AFRICA 

In its modern aspects the problem of land division in Africa, and 
particularly in the cooler uplands, involves European nations in many 
complex questions that cannot be really understood unless they are 
placed in their historical setting. This setting we shall now attempt 
to supply. 

The first period of European control of Africa was in the second Early 
half of the 15th century, when traders, chiefly Portuguese, sailed along ^^^^ e°. 
the west coast. Before America was discovered they had reached pension 
the southwestern extremity of the continent. Another Portuguese 
expedition at this time explored the Red Sea and reached India ; in 
1498 Vasco da Gama sailed up the east coast and also reached India ; 
the Far East was next brought within the field of European trade, 
and a Portuguese settlement, still in existence, was founded at Macao, 
in China. The Enghsh and Dutch foUowed quickly. Africa itself 
was then of less commercial interest than the Orient. The rival 
nations were content with mere footholds that served as way stations 



540 



The New World 



Beginnings 
of colonial 
rivalry 



Explora- 
tion of 
central 
Africa 



for ship repair and revictualing. The British had St. Helena, and 
later a part of the Gold Coast ; the Dutch, Table Bay (Cape Town) ; 
and the Portuguese, Zanzibar. In fact, down to the period of the 
exploring expeditions and missionary journeys of Livingstone (1840- 
1873), Africa had not been penetrated at all effectively, as the maps 
of sixty years ago clearly demonstrate ; and as a colonizing field it 
was thought expensive, unhealtliful, and of little value. In a general 
way the native brought his wares to the coast {e.g. Cape Town, Dar 
es Salaam, Sofala, Table Bay, Loanda) or to a few commercially 
strategic inland centers {e.g. Lake Ngami). 

But when European industrialization had developed a need for 
raw materials that yearly grew more active, when vacant spaces 
in the Pacific, the Far East, and southern and western Asia had been 
allocated, with South America a politically closed world on account of 
the Monroe Doctrine, Africa was the only large free realm in which 
political power and colonial trade could yet be won together. France 
annexed Algeria between 1830 and 1847 ; the English occupied a few 
places at the southern end of the continent, from which they had 
crowded the Boers, who thereupon established their settlements 
inland beyond the Orange River; Morocco was independent; the 
Turkish Empire nominally extended along the whole northern coast, 
but effectively was limited to Egypt and Libya. For the rest only 
scattered settlements and trading- posts on the coast had been estab- 
lished by the European nations, including Holland (until 1871), Spain, 
Denmark (until 1850), and Portugal — but not Germany; the be- 
ginning of German colonial policy was a thing of much later growth. 

The memorable explorations of Stanley at last efTectively awoke 
Africa. He crossed the continent from 1874 to 1878, explored the 
great Congo River system, and untangled some of the long-discussed 
complexities of the equatorial lakes. By 1880 the whole civihzed 
world was interested in the exploration story of Africa. The more 
enlightened nations of Europe were determined to stamp out slave 
trading, which was still carried on extensively in the interior, though 
the exportation of slaves from Africa had practically ceased by 1850. 

No other continent had such large unappropriated spaces, so many 
unattached peoples. There followed a general European rush for 
territory desirable chiefly because of its commercial value rather than 
as a home for colonists. The period of exploration of the interior 
therefore became the period of partition and of appropriation by big 
trading companies and concessionaires. France assumed a pro- 
tectorate over Tunis in 1881 ; England occupied Egypt in 1882 ; 



African Colonies of the European Powers 541 

Portugal put forth claims to much of the Congo, as well as the hinter- 
land of Mozambique, where English traders and missionaries had 
penetrated. Belgium called a conference of the powers in 1876 whose 
outcome was an International African Association, and in 1885 
Leopold II, King of the Belgians, declared himseK sovereign of the 
Congo Free State. In less than half a century the interior of Africa 
had been transformed from an unknown wilderness to the colonial 
frontier of Europe. 

From that time to this, there has never been a moment when the Africa 
colonial policies of the European nations have not been profoundly to the" 
affected by the African situation. Germany was at first more in- ^^^^^°l, 
terested in her African colonies than she was in her Pacific possessions 
or the Near East. Only as late as 1904 were the long-standing differ- 
ences between France and Great Britain that had once threatened 
war (the Fashoda incident, page 558) at last composed by a division 
of spheres of influence. In 1911 the Agadir crisis (page 107) almost 
precipitated war between Germany and France. 

FORMER GERMAN COLONIES IN AFRICA 

The chief effect of the war upon the political geography of Africa 
was the transfer of the four German colonies of Togoland, the Cam- 
eroons, German Southwest Africa, and German East Africa to France, 
Great Britain, Belgium, and Portugal. By skillful diplomatic work 
at Berhn and by remarkable activity in the field, Germany had won 
these four territories in the face of active British, French, and Portu- 
guese opposition, laid claim to a part of the Sudan bordering Lake 
Tchad, elbowed France down to the Congo, pushed the northeastern 
corner of German Southwest Africa over to the Zambesi River (the 
Caprivi saUent, Fig. 14), and as a result was in position to plan stiU 
broader African conquests. The addresses of her statesmen leave 
no room for doubt that had she won the World War a Central African 
realm under German control would have been created out of Portu- 
guese and Belgian territory and German domination would have been 
assured in the African politics of the future. 

Every year Germany was losing nearly 250,000 of her population. Colonial 
who went to foreign lands, and it was her hope that parts of these emigrants 
African colonies might provide homes for some of her numerous ^°^* , 

. . . n source of 

emigrants, though her chief interest lay in the development of the raw ma- 
plantation system and use of native labor for the production of tropi- q^^^I^ 
cal raw materials, supplies of which she also hoped to command, mius 
Great Britain and America control 90 per cent of the world's cotton 



542 



The New World 



, 



The large 

native 

population 



The cool 
interioi* 
tableland, 
capable of 
develop- 
ment by 
white men 



supply, and for about three fourths of her cotton Germany had to 
rely on the United States, for about one fourth on Egypt and India. 
Of special value to German industry was the production in her African 
possessions of oils, particularly palm oil. While production was not 
high, it was in the way of rapid development. Germany's increasing 
importation of food had also turned her attention to the possibilities 
of food production in her African colonies. 

The territories and resources that Germany lost and that France, 
Belgium, and Great Britain gained will be briefly described in the 
succeeding sections. 

Tanganyika Territory {former German East Africa) 

More was heard about German East Africa, now Tanganyika 
Territory, than any other German colony because it is relatively 
more thickly populated and was the most valuable of all Germany's 
African possessions. It has a total area of 384,000 square miles, or 
nearly twice that of the whole former German Empire. The native 
population numbers nearly 8,000,000 and is of excellent stock, trained 
to agriculture. In addition there are about 15,000 people from India 
and Arabia, and a population of 5300 whites. 

The least favorable portion of Tanganyika Territory is the coastal 
strip from 10 to 30 miles wide in the north and broader in the south. 
This is a fever-infested region of heavy rainfall and poor drainage. 
Farther west is the interior tableland, marked at its eastern margin 
by broken country with steep streams. There is a well-marked dry 
season, and the natural vegetation of the interior is savana, grass 
steppe, or scrub. Variation of rehef gives opportunity for great 
variety in cultivated products. At present the most important 
plantation crops are sisal hemp or rubber (Ceara). There are con- 
siderable possibiUties for coffee and cotton production and for cattle 
raising in districts free from tsetse fly. On the slopes of KiHmanjaro 
and the Usambara Highlands products of more temperate latitudes 
can be grown. Though hmited in area, these districts should be 
valuable as a "white man's country." 

Two railways now connect the upland with the coast, one south of 
Kilimanjaro Mountain, near the frontier of Kenya Colony (British 
East Africa), and another from the port of Dar es Salaam. 

Ruanda constitutes the densely populated, northwestern part of Ger- 
man East Africa. It has now been detached from former German 
East Africa, which (as Kenya Colony) passed under British man- 
date and has been added to the Belgian Congo (Figs. 5 and Q6). 



African Colonies of the European Powers 



543 




Fig. 266. Map of Tanganyika Territory, formerly German East Africa; at present adminis- 
tered by Great Britain as the mandatary of the League of Nations, except for the northwest- 
ern corner, ceded to Belgium. 



German Southwest Africa 

German Southwest Africa is important, not because of the number a desert 
of inhabitants, but for its extent and its relation to the protection th^yin. 
of the Union of South Africa, with which it is continuous. It is a hai>ited 
huge desert region with an area of 325,000 square miles, a native 
population of 250,000, and a white population that numbered 15,000 
in 1914. It has been turned over to the Union of South Africa, 
with which it has connection by rail and by sea. 

The coastal desert is from fifteen to eighty-five miles wide. It is 
marked by great sand ridges p led up by the southwesterly winds to 
heights that in places reach several hundred feet. The rainfall is, 
for the most part, less than one inch a year. Fogs are characteristic, 



544 



The New World 



A fog- 
bound 
coast, with 
sand dunes 
and off- 
shore 
guano 
islands 



Grazing 
the prin- 
cipal oc- 
cupation 



British and 
French 
division of 
the Came- 
roons 



Products 
and their 
export 



due to the cold longshore current from the south. There are guano 
deposits on the offshore islands. The whole region resembles the 
Atacama-Tarapac:! desert coast of western South America. Farther 
inland the rainfall increases on account of higher elevation and better 
exposure to the winds, and there are grazing lands of value. Still 
farther east is the Desert of Kalahari, with an interior drainage ending 
in salt pans, and with belts of dunes and scattered vegetation. 

There will never be a large population — the aridity is too intense. 
The grass is scattered, and the amount of stock that can be supported 
is small. It is estimated that the whole of German Southwest Africa 
cannot maintain more than five thousand farms. There are diamond 
washings of considerable value, and in 1913 ivory and copper ex- 
ports constituted 95 per cent of the total. But the principal occupa- 
tion is the grazing of cattle, of which there are 200,000 head, besides 
1,000 000 sheep and goats. 

The Cameroons 

In February 1916 the British government accepted the French 
proposal for the administrative division of the Cameroons by France 
and Great Britain. It was arranged also that in case the question 
of the cession of the region to a third power should be raised, Great 
Brita'n was to have the first refusal of the port of Duala. 

This was during the World War. But in the peace treaty with 
Germany it was arranged to have the former German colonies governed 
under the mandate system, and France and Great Britain became the 
mandatory powers. France controls the Cameroons, save that the 
small portion west of the main mountain range but including Cam- 
eroon Mountain (Fig. 267) is now joined to British Nigeria. The 
boundary between Nigeria and the Cameroons was an arbitrary one 
and therefore disturbing to native life. In the final settlement of the 
affairs of the colony there was made a rectification of this frontier, 
and the new boundary runs in such a way as least to disturb local 
tribal arrangements. 

The products of the Cameroons are mahogany, rubber, palm oil, 
cacao, and small quantities of tobacco and cotton. It has valuable 
grasslands in the interior, though these are difficult of access. The 
rubber resources might have led to the great development of the 
colony, had it not been for the competition of East India rubber, 
which began to be produced on a great scale in 1913, and which so 
reduced the price that the gathering of rubber from wild sources by 
primitive methods was no longer profitable. 



African Colonies of the European Powers 



545 



The colony has an 
area of less than 200,000 
square miles and a total 
population of more 
than 2,500,000. Be- 
sides unhealthfulness 
in the lowlands, the 
chief physical difficulty 
in its development is 
the large number of 
falls which break the 
courses of the streams 
and thus prevent trans- 
portation of the interior 
products by cheap 
methods. Commerce 
would be almost at a 
standstill were it not 
for two small railroads 
which have been ex- 
tended inland beyond 
the belt of falls. 

Togoland 
By agreement made 




between France and 
Great Britain in 1919, 



British and 
French di- 
vision of 
the country 



administration of the 
western strip of Togo- 
land (Fig. 268); the 
former took over the 
liigher and cooler east- 



FiG. 267. French Equatorial Africa now includes the whole of 
the large region called the Cameroons, except for a narrow 
strip on the northwest which has been added to British Nigeria. 
the latter assumed the That part north and west of the heavy solid line is mandated 

territory; that part south and east of this line is ceded to 
France unconditionally according to Article 125 of the treaty 
of Versailles, thereby restoring the boundary of 1911, modified 
in Germany's favor at the time of the Agadir incident (foot- 
note, page 107). Note the northern limit of the equatorial 
forest, which suggests the grazing lands that lie between the 
forest and the desert Sahara beyond Lake Tchad. The 
Geographical Review, Vol. 5, 1918. 

ern districts. 

France and Great Britain have agreed to make a joint recommenda- Future of 
tron to the League of Nations regarding the fate of Togoland. It was °^° ^° 
the smallest of Germany's African colonies, and the most densely in- 
habited, with at least 1,000,000 native population. The country is 
unhealthful near the coast, but the highlands are capable of great agri- 
cultural development (Fig. 268) . This is one of the colonies from which 
Germany hoped to get an increasing quantity of cotton for her home 



546 



The New World 



Resources 
and diffi- 
culties in 
exploitation 



New rules 
of the 
game 




manufactures. There 
are also valuable cacao 
and tobacco plantations, 
but they are small in ex- 
tent. As a source of 
pahn oil the region, hke 
the rest of West Africa, 
is of constantly increas- 
ing importance. The 
colony has no good port. 
The most serious con- 
dition to be overcome is 
the spread of sleeping 
sickness by the tsetse 
fly, which infests the un- 
derbrush near the coast 
and along the rivers. 
From Figure 265, it will 
be seen that Togoland is 
particularly aff'ected by 
this disease. 



THE 



PRINCIPLE OF 
MANDATE 



THE 



The new arrangements 
of the Peace Conference 
of Paris regarding Africa 
have grown out of the 
old problems. TheAlhes 
have discipUned Ger- 
many, it is true; but 
they have also made 
rules for themselves. 
The purpose was not 
merely to take away 
from Germany some 
colonial possessions, but 

268 Old and new boundaries in Togoland, one of ^^ providc agaiust the 
(jrermany s four African colonies before 1914. The western . . 

portion is now- a British mandatary, the eastern a French kind of Cvils that shc had 

man atary. practiced as wcll as the 

evils that the European nations saw in each other's poHcies and plans. 



Fig. 



African Colonies of the European Powers 547 

In estimating the probable success of the new scheme for the control The 
of former German territory in Africa under the mandate system of ^stem*°'^^ 
the League of Nations, we should not lose sight of the hitherto universal yet untried 
failure of schemes for joint control. The condominium was a failure 
in Seunoa and led to the division of the island group between Great 
Britain, Germany, and the United States. Joint control has been 
sadly deficient in the New Hebrides. In Tangier, it has been a dis- 
grace to Europe. France and Great Britain gave up joint control 
of Egypt after a short trial. The Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 was 
designed to estabHsh international rules for the expansion of European 
national claims to African territory, and although the effect as to the 
trade in arms, liquors, and slaves was beneficial, it increased rather 
than diminished the intensity of the scramble for territory. The 
new plan, however, has two promising features : (l) it takes control 
out of the hands of one power and places it in the hands of the several 
powers associated in the League of Nations, thus inviting review and 
correction of official acts ; (2) it leaves actual administration to a single 
power, thus providing against the delays and abuses of joint re- 
sponsibihty. 

TRADE POLICIES AND NATIVE CONTROL 

In spite of eagerness for territory in Africa, none of the European African 
powers were able to make their tropical colonies a commercial success, a*fiMnciai 
except Germany in Togoland and Great Britain in Nigeria. All burden 
had preferential trade agreements which favored their own commerce. 
The colonies were reserved for the benefit of the traders of the home 
country. This was the pohcy of the French, for instance, in northern 
Africa, in Senegal, French Guinea, and Madagascar. For example, French 
in the colonies of French West Africa there is a 7 per cent ad valorem ^'jJe""*'*^ 
surtax upon all goods coming from countries other than France, and 
there are restrictions upon the export of vegetable oil products to all 
countries except France. The natural result of French policy was 
the virtual extinction of British and German trade in the French Congo 
and Madagascar. There is scarcely such a thing as free commerce in 
Tunis. Privileges of great value, known as concessions, are also part 
of the plan of aiding French commerce. The only exceptions, in 
fact, were Dahomey, the Ivory Coast, and French Somaliland. To 
foster her wine business France has permitted and even pushed the 
sale of brandy and absinthe throughout Tunis, Algeria, and French 
West Africa, just as England permits a profitable gin trade with 
southern Nigeria. 



548 



The New World 



Welfare of 
the native 



Native rule 
not always 
possible 



Slave and 

liquor 

traffic 



These things are secondary, however, to the question of relations 
with the natives, whose welfare must be the chief thought of the 
European powers if the risks of bitterness and racial war are to be 
reduced. In the ill-treatment of the African native, Germany was 
easily first; though at one time or another every European power, 
and especially Portugal, had treated the native cruelly. In 1904 
Germany pushed her punishment of the Herero tribes of German 
Southwest Africa to the point where these people were reduced in 
number from 60,000 to 18,000. MiUions of Moslem Berbers and 
Arabs in French North Africa dislike the French (because they are 
Christian, not because they are French) as much as the Moslem 
Egyptians dislike the English. 

The peace treaties of 1919 provide rehef for some of the causes of 
dissatisfaction on the part of the native, short of granting him po- 
litical control. The European nations cannot leave large sections 
of the world's low-grade populations to their fate. Zeal for the 
happiness and welfare of the native cannot always be carried to the 
point of permitting him to do as he wishes ; had the United States 
left the Filipinos to themselves, their islands would soon have 
been in a state of anarchy and probably would thereafter have be- 
longed to Japan. Firmly as this principle has become embedded in 
foreign-office poHcies and justifiable as it seems from the general point 
of view, it must not be forgotten that it is, except in a few instances, 
outside the thought of the people to whom it is applied. Some of 
them would indeed prefer anarchy to foreign rule. 

If France were to withdraw from northern Africa, it would be a dis- 
aster to civiHzation there as great as that which followed the fall 
of the Roman Empire, when the Roman settlements of the same land 
one dy one were abandoned and fields long cultivated reverted to the 
desert. Equally dark would be the prospect if England withdrew 
unconditionally from Egypt. 

INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENTS RESPECTING LIQUOR TRAFFIC, 
LAVE TRADE, AND PROTECTION OF WILD ANIMALS 

After Stanley's return from the exploration of the Congo, the 
European rivalry for territorial gains in Africa became still more 
intense. This led to a number of international projects and agree- 
ments, to which at least brief reference must be made. These were 
foreshadowed by the Brussels Conference of 1876, called by the King 
of the Belgians while Stanley was yet in Africa. Its object was the 
opening up of the continent through an International African As- 



African Colonies of the European Powers 549 

sociation. At first international in character, this soon became an 
almost purely Belgian organization, and by various steps, too detailed 
to record here, led to the acquisition of the Congo by King Leopold 
of Belgium. The Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 established the 
Congo Free State, provided for traffic regulation of the Congo River, 
laid down a free-trade zone in central Africa, and fixed the condi- 
tions of ownersliip by rival European powers. A second Brussels 
Conference, in 1890, delimited a slave-trade zone and a zone in which 
trade in arms and spirituous liquors was to be regulated. 

The slave trade is an old question in African administration. Early Suppression 
in the 19th century slave trading was prohibited by the more en- ll^^J^ 
lightened European powers. Slavery itself was abolished by nearly 
all the powers by about the middle of the 19th century. But slave 
trading continued to be active in the interior of Africa. For years 
before the defeat of the Mahdist forces at Omdurman in 1898, slave- 
raiding Arabs under Mahdist control terrorized the natives of the 
Sudan. Even now slave trading has not been wholly discontinued. 
Until the ItaUan occupation of Tripoli in 1912 the Senussi (page 57) 
sent slaves through Benghazi and, with the help of the Turks, received 
arms and ammunitions. Today the traffic is under the ban of law, 
and international cooperation is chiefly responsible for its lessening 
practice. 

The regulation of the liquor traffic was of peculiar importance to 
the development of the African native. It is bad morality as well as 
bad busuiess to debauch the native. His temper is more ardent, his 
impulses less subject to control, than in the case of the white. 

Unless the civilized world is prepared to back up by force, if Police 
necessary, and especially by strict pohce regulation, the control of tkm^for 
the sale of Hquor to the natives of Africa, they might better be left to control of 
run their own affairs. The world was shocked by the extent and 
cruelty of the slave trade ; in the 19th century it was one of the 
chief pretexts of the European colonizing nations that they were bent 
on controlling territory so as to control the slave trade ; it gave a 
pious turn to their acts which peculiarly fitted the spirit of the 
age. But it were far better to continue the slave trade under purely 
native responsibility than to substitute for it the unUcensed use of 
liquor. 

Between the heavy lines of Figure 269 there was defined by the Protec- 
Brussels Conference of 1890 a zone for the preservation of wild ani- g°rae^^^*^ 
mals, and this was confirmed by the Convention of London, May 
1900. It is a matter of very great importance to the continent of 



550 



The New World 




l'/^:-:':'! S/ai/e trade zone 
V/y/^A Conventiona/ basin of the Congo 
^^^^ Eastern rnaritime zone 
^^^ Boundary of zone for regulation 
, of traffic in arms and spir- 

ituous liquors 
European possessions^^ 

British LAGOS 

French SENEGAL 

German CAMEROONS 

Portuguese ANGOLA 

Spanish canary is. 

Italian ASSAB 



Fig. 269. The black areas represent European possessions in 1884 before the Berlin Conference 
of that year. The upper half of the legend represents international regulations adopted at the 
Berlin Conference and the Brussels Conference of 1890. After Keltic, The Partition of Africa, 
1895. There was added by the London Convention of 1900 a zone of protection of wild animals 
extending from the Zambesi and the northern limit of German Southwest Africa up to the twen- 
tieth parallel of north latitude. 

Africa, which has the largest and most varied assortment of big game 
animals in the world. On the grasslands bordering the central tropi- 
cal forest area, on the south and east, there are still many zebras, 
gazelles, hippos, rhinos, and waterbuck. They are in locahties where 
they do not interfere with present settlements and should be protected 
on huge reserves regulated by law. They have been exterminated 
in some places in order to prevent destruction of the crops of settlers ; 
but the process of extermination serves no useful purpose elsewhere, 



African Colonies of the European Powers 551 

especially when carried on by irresponsible hunters intent on making 
a record of killings. 

BENEFITS OF COLONIAL DEVELOPMENT 

We gam some idea of the possible benefits of colonial development Work of the 
by looking at what France has already accomplished in northern northern" 
Africa. The farms that the Romans had made with such care the ^"'^^ 
French found a desert, and they immediately set to work to reclaim 
them by making hundreds of artesian wells, by damming up the 
streams that had been allowed to waste their precious waters in the 
sand, by fighting the swarms of locusts. Lion, hyena, and leopard had 
ravaged the flocks and herds ; the French set to work to exterminate 
them in the neighborhood of settlements. They built several thou- 
sands of miles of roads and constructed hundreds of miles of railways. 
The fine cedars of the Atlas Mountains were in the way of extinction, 
and the French forest service came just in time to save them. By 
many different means France has placed under cultivation at least 
100,000 square miles of land (or about twice the area of Colorado or 
Alabama) that was formerly desert waste. 

In 1894 Timbuktu was captured and the indigenous population 
released from the tyranny of its Tuareg masters. Since then east- 
ward penetration has progressed apace. Before and during the World 
War, Tilho explored a vast area northeast and east of Lake Tchad, 
including the fastnesses of Tibesti. With small detachments, chiefly 
of native troops, he sought out and dispersed those tribesmen who, 
under Senussi influence (page 57), sought to consolidate Moslem 
power in one of the least accessible places in the French Sahara. The 
isolated territories on the southern edge of the Sahara thus brought 
under the French peace are susceptible of economic development, 
provided they can be made more accessible. Plans for a trans- Saharan 
raflroad to this end include a fine across the Sahara, connecting the 
coast of Algiers with the Niger and Lake Tchad, which shall even- 
tually connect with the British system that reaches north from Cape 
Town (Figs. 15 and 49). 

Best of all, France has done these things with little disturbance to French re- 
native poHtical and social organization ; she has taken no land away ^p^P* ^°^ 
from native holders ; she has put money and effort into the improve- rights 
ment of the fife of the people. Her work has extended into Mada- 
gascar, where the Hovas, a tyrannical Malayo-Polynesian people who 
settled in the island in the 16th century, had long practiced slavery, 
thus depopulating large tracts in the south and southwest. 



55^ 



The New World 



Portuguese 
policies in 
Africa 



Heligo- 
land and 
Zanzibar 



British 
Uganda 
Protecto- 
rate 



MINOR COLONIAL PROBLEMS AND TRADE INTERESTS IN AFRICA ^ 

The possessions of the smaller powers in Africa are bound to give 
trouble in the future. The Portuguese, for example, have carried 
the pohcy of differential duties on colonial commerce to such an ex- 
treme as practically to shut out all trade except with Portugal. If 
they had money and men with which to develop their own coun- 
try, matters might not be so bad. But Portugal itself is poor and 
feeble^ with a population under 6,000,000. It has lower railway 
mileage than any other country of its size in Europe. Its colonial 
governors follow no fixed policy except one of weakness and immoral 
toleration of the sale of liquor to the native. The home government 
has been so unstable during the past ten years that it has completely 
demoralized colonial administration. In southern Angola there has 
been fairly rapid development, with the help of British capital and 
enterprise. Spanish Guinea belongs to the same class of feebly devel- 
oped colonies ; Spain has long ceased to be a capable colonizing nation. 

Perhaps no other part of the British Empire seems to us as re- 
mote as Zanzibar, yet were any other power to try to get possession 
of it, a political storm would be aroused in England. The Zanzibar 
Arabs have favored the British in trade and politics ; British strategy 
in relation to India and South Africa requires possession of the re- 
gion ; cables have been laid to it. It is a British protectorate with 
Zanzibar Town as a free port. England's position there, long con- 
tested by Germany, was finally confirmed and strengthened by the 
Anglo-German treaty of 1890, when she ceded Heligoland to Ger- 
many in exchange for additional rights in Zanzibar and Pemba. The 
cession of Heligoland was felt at the time to be of doubtful advantage, 
and it became a matter of great regret to Great Britain in the World 
War, when that island became a base of operations for the German 
High Seas Fleet. 

It was in 1890 also that, by the terms of an agreement with Ger- 
many, Great Britain assumed a protectorate over Uganda. Egypt, 
the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Uganda, and British East Africa, thus 
connected, form a broad strip, of imperial extent, that looks out upon 
the Mediterranean at one end and upon the Indian Ocean at the 
other. It flanks the route to India. Possession of it put the Cape- 
to-Cairo project a step nearer realization. 



\ 



1 The major colonial interests of the great powers are described in the separate chapters 
on these powers; e.g., Egypt and South Africa, in Chapter Two, Imperial Problems of Great 
Britain. 



African Colonies of the European Powers 553 

Germany was well satisfied with these changes, because with increased 
them went substantial advantages for herself. Besides HeHgoland po^*^ 
she obtained the Caprivi sahent, a long arm of territory extending ^"<=* 
from German Southwest Africa eastward to the Zambesi (Fig. 15) ; 
she extended the northern boundary of Cameroons to Lake Tchad ; 
she became estabhshed in the Victoria Nyanza region inland as far 
as the Belgian Congo. 

France was equally fortunate. By the Anglo-French agreement French 
of 1890 she established a protectorate over Madagascar (it became a JJ°Morocco 
French colony in 1896) and became the recognized power of the 
western Sahara. In 1904 she had her favored position in Morocco 
recognized by Great Britain. Recognition by Germany came only 
in 1911 after the Agadir incident, as explained previously (page 107). 
France then bought German recognition of her Moroccan position 
by ceding to Germany a large section of French Equatorial Africa 
(strip to the Congo, Fig. 267). 

There remained a dispute between France and Spain which ex- 
plains the odd disposition of territory south of the Straits of Gibral- 
tar. Naturally, Spain has always been interested in the African coast 
opposite her. In 1912 she confirmed France's special position in 
Morocco and herself obtained a narrow strip along the coast, now 
called the Spanish Zone, and in addition an enclave on the south- 
western coast of Morocco at Ifni. Two hundred and fifty square 
miles at Tangier became an "international zone" (Figs. 80 and 81). 



WEST AFRICA 

West Africa includes a belt of territory nearly 3000 miles long, ex- 
tending from Mauretania at the western end of the Sahara south and 
east as far as the Portuguese possessions in the Congo region (Fig. 82). 
It comprises a score of organized states belonging to Great Britain, 
France, Belgium, Spain, and Portugal. Including the Belgian Congo 
(pages 125 to 128), the region has nearly a half -billion dollars' worth of 
trade, carried on at more than forty ports. Great Britain has most 
of the trade ; Germany ranked second before 1914. West Africa in- 
cludes Togoland and the Cameroons, former German possessions now 
divided between Great Britain and France as mandatory powers of 
the League of Nations (Figs. 267 and 268). Great Britain owns the 
richest territory and the largest number of trade agencies. Her posi- 
tion and interests, to which we now turn, illustrate the value of West 
Africa in the commercial world. 



554 



The New World 



Com- 
mercial 
rivalry in 
West 
Africa 



I «5i Helena 

BELTS OF VEGETATION 



r I Cereals, ground nuts, sugar; 
I . I tobacco and fruits 
"TTol Pa/m oil, shea buffer, and 
" ° other vegetable fafs 

.'J*"*! Pasture lands 




Fig. 270. West Africa, from the Congo to Senegal, has been the field of keenest commercial 
rivalry in respect of raw materials. Note the variety and concentration of vegetation belts there. 
A small white population controls the commercial system of a large native population in West 
Africa. The map is diagrammatic in part, as in the Nile Valley and in the interior of the Sahara 
and of Arabia. After Sir Harry Johnston, the Geographical Journal, Vol. 45, 1915- 

Among Great Britain's possessions, British West Africa, next to 
India, is the most important from the standpoint of raw materials. 
It includes (without the recent British portions of the mandated areas 
of Togoland and Cameroons) Sierra Leone, the Gold Coast, Nigeria, 
and Gambia, and contains 20,000,000 native people in an area of 
450,000 square miles. Ocean transportation being the cheapest there 
is in the world, and the distance- from West Africa to the Enghsh 
Channel being but three thousand miles, the rich resources of the 



African Colonies of the European Powers 555 

region became the object of strong commercial rivalry between Ger- 
many and Great Britain. As a result of the World War and the 
peace settlement, Germany is now out of this market ; her agencies 
are gone, she has lost her former prestige among the natives, she 
has no ships for the carrying trade. 

West Africa is rich in cacao and palm oil particularly, although Valuable 
it has important tin, coal, and gold deposits, as well as an increas- [o^fe"d^*^ 
ing production of timber, nuts, rubber, fiber, and cotton. Among industry 
these the richest in immediate possibilities is jjalm oil. With the 
rapid development of machine industry, lubricating oil is in great 
demand; the world's consumption of soap is also steadily growing; 
substitutes for butter are now in favor. AU these things and more 
the palm tree will supply. From the seed an oil is obtained that has 
the greatest variety of uses. From Nigeria alone, in 1917, there were 
$20,000,000 of palm oil exports, or almost one half the total in value. 
Southern Nigeria has the further advantage of having a dense popu- 
lation of more than 100 to the square mile, and here there is the 
greatest degree of prosperity, owing to large quantities of raw material 
that may be gathered or produced upon the hot and wet coastal 
lowlands and to geographical position, or accessibility. 

Before the war Germany took most of the palm-nut exports, em- Diversion 
ploying even the meal of the nut for cattle feed. This trade has q^^^^^° 
now been diverted entirely to British firms, who are about to open Britain 
additional motor roads and railways in order to tap several thousand the war 
square miles of palm territory, native transportation methods being 
primitive. Hand in hand with such development will go the stimula- 
tion of other lines of production, especially cotton and cacao. In 
1916 the cacao produced on the Gold Coast alone was valued at 
$18,000,000. 

ADEN 

In connection with the minor European colonies in the horn of Aden as 
Africa mention must be made of the adjacent Arabian territory per- ^grdaT 
taining to the port of Aden. Though the British territory at Aden focus of a 
has only 50,000 people, who live on very poor land totaling about 80 
square miles, the British protectorate covers some 9000 square miles. 
The place is important because of its strategic value in the defense of 
India and the Suez Canal, and because it is the focus of the Red Sea 
trade as well as that of Abyssinia and all that eastern portion of Africa 
known as French, British, and Italian Somahland. All told, the 
population of the region of which Aden is the commercial focus is above 



large region 



I 



556 



The Neio World 



Nomadic 
peoples of 
Somaliland 



I 



V'Mbclia 

10 70 M 




oAddiflAbbaba \^^ 
ABYSSINIA ""-^^ 



Pig. 271. The Aden region and the Strait of Bab el Mandeb, a focal point of eastern trade 
with Europe. The British own Perim Island, between which and the French possession of 
Sheikh Said lies the principal ship channel. Each power is therefore anxious to get control of 
the other's position. 

12,000,000, and the region includes 850,000 square miles of territory, 
in places capable of early development. 

THE THREE SOMALILANDS AND ERITREA 

British, French, and Itahan Somaliland are aUke in possessing an 
arid or semi-arid lowland that rises in the interior to hills and table- 
lands with a somewhat moister chmate, particularly in British Somali- 
land. The people are everywhere nomadic, moving from one water 
hole to another with their flocks and herds according to the seasons. 
They are all Moslems, practically without education, and all are in a 
measure difficult to govern. Except for the seaports there are no 
towns and hardly any permanent villages. No newspapers or other 
periodicals are published in Somaliland. 

Area and Population of Somaliland by Political Divisions 



Area in 
Sq. Mi. 



Popula- 
tion 



Products Exported 



British Somaliland 
French Somaliland 
Italian Somaliland 



68,000 

5,800 

139,000 



300,000 
208,000 
400,000 



Hides and skins, gum arabic, 

cattle, ghee butter 
Hides and skins, coffee, ivory, 

beeswax 
Hides and skins, butter, durra 

(a kind of millet) 



Statistics of area and population for the three Somalilands vary 
greatly according to the point of view. For example, the most recent 
French figures, in the Annuaire Statistique, 1917, give 46,000 square 



African Colonies of the European Powers 557 

miles as the area of French Somahland, the Statesman's Year-Book 
gives 5800, and the Encyclopaedia Britannica gives 12,000. 

Through French Somaliland via the Franco-Ethiopian railway to 
the port of Djibouti and through British Somahland via camel cara- 
van routes to the port of Berbera (the capital) comes the principal 
part of the overland transit trade of Abyssinia. This fact and the 
grazing possibilities of the grasslands of the region explain the conflict 
of claims in the hinterland for the ill-defined eastern part of Abyssinia. 

Besides Italian Somaliland and Libya, Italy holds also the small Italian 
colony of Eritrea on the coast of the Red Sea. The coastal belt is Eritrea" 
barren and sandy, but inland there is a fertile central plateau with 
a cool climate and a better water supply. There has been Kttle de- 
velopment of the region up to the present time. Its 45,800 square 
miles are inhabited by 330,000 people, divided between settled vil- 
lagers on the plateau and pastoral tribes in the lowlands. Life is so 
primitive that there is very little commerce, and the colony has no 
real conomercial importance at the present time, except as a transit 
land for Abyssinian trade and as a focus (at the port of Massowah) 
for a part of the Red Sea coast of Arabia. The colony stands out 
in industrial development principally by reason of the low grade of 
development of the regions adjacent. Besides stock raising there 
is pearl fishing and potash mining and, in recent years, even meat 
packing. An Italian government mission has just surveyed the 
resources of the colony, in view of Italy's acute need for additional 
raw materials. 

THE INDEPEINDENT STATES OF ABYSSINIA A]VD LIBERIA 

Abyssinia is one of two independent states in Africa. It has an unique 
area estimated at 400,000 square miles and is largely isolated from ^byJiJ^a* 
surrounding lands by its mountainous character and the deep canyons f nd its 
that nick the outer borders of its plateaus. There is a limited amount tionli re- 
of barren lowland, especially on the east and south, but the plateau lotions 
and mountain sections have a cool and moist climate. The popula- 
tion numbers between 8,000,000 and 10,000,000. While the state of 
development of these people is low and their standard of living simple, 
they are so numerous as to furnish the basis for a considerable trade. 
Ivory, beeswax, and gums have been the standard exports, and re- 
cently potash has been worked on a commercial scale. There are also 
undeveloped coal and oil resources. 

The eastern frontier of Abyssinia has never been accurately de- 
fined, and here there has been rivalry between France, Great Britain 



"558 The New World 

and Italy for possession of the land. The Fashoda incident of 1898 
brought Great Britain and France to the verge of armed conflict.^ 
Origin and The ncgro republic of Liberia is situated on the west African coast 

chfl.rfl.ct6r 

of Liberia between Sierra Leone (British) and the Ivory Coast (French). Its 
total area is about 40,000 square miles (a little less than that of Penn- 
sylvania) and the population has been variously estimated, the figures 
ranging from 700,000 to about 2,000,000, of whom all but about 50,000 
on the coast are quite uncivihzed. Liberians of American origin 
number some 12,000. 

The foundation of the republic was the result of efforts made by 
the American Colonization Society, founded in 1816 to settle free 
American negroes on African soil. In 1820 actual settlement began, 
and in 1847 the colonists promulgated a declaration of independence 
and drew up a constitution. Even today the government does not 
effectively control the interior regions, and this has led to the pro- 
gressive diminution of Liberia's territory by French encroachment. 
Should this or similar absorption by Europeans threaten Liberia with 
real danger of extinction, the United States would doubtless play a 
guardian's part. 
Interests of The political influence of the United States has been carried 
states'ln directly into Africa by treaty with Liberia, so that the United 
Liberia States has now assumed obhgations that cover a stretch of 15,000 
miles, or three fifths of the circumference of the earth, from Liberia 
to the Philippines. The United States loaned Liberia $5,000,000 in 
1918 for the construction of roads, etc., and has assumed the position 
of chief financial adviser to the republic, a position which was pre- 
viously held by a joint commission of representatives of Great 
Britain, the United States, and Germany. 

The development of the resources of the region is hindered some- 
what by the constitutional provision that none but Liberian citizens 
may hold real estate, except for colonization, missionary, educational, 
or other benevolent purposes. The present head of the government of 
Liberia holds broader views of the country's future than his predeces- 
sors held and is seeking to provide better commercial opportunities for 
whites, upon whom the economic progress of the country must depend. 

1 With the intention of linking her possessions in east and west Africa across the terri- 
tory of the Upper Nile, France penetrated to Fashoda, a fortress on the Upper Nile, in 
1898, at just the time that Kitchener, after defeating the Dervishes at Omdurman, was 
proceeding up river to complete the conquest of the Sudan. Extreme diplomatic tension 
was created by the meeting of the rival militeu-y forces, and actual hostiUties were averted 
only with great difficulty. The outcome was the withdrawal of the French and hence a 
British victory. 



CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR 

LATIN-AMERICAN TRADE AND BOUNDARY DISPUTES: RELATIONS 
TO THE UNITED STATES 

The great problems of our time are not confined to European fields. Worid- 
They occur in almost every occupied part of the world from Spits- J^Jutionof 
bergen to South Georgia. With the use of airplane and submarine problem 
for commercial and strategic purposes, even remote islets have a 
new importance. The natural pastures of the moss-covered tundras 
of Siberia, Lapland, and northern North America are now thinly 
inhabited and of low value, but they may some day be the scene of 
strong rivalry as a source of meat supply. At some future time 
even the sea may be marked out politically in zones of economic 
development, if the food value of its hordes of now unused but useful 
marine organisms should ever be developed. The Amazon valley, 
hot, forested, unhealthful, and thinly inhabited, seems now of small 
importance ; but it may yet be a source of incalculable energy when 
medical science conquers the tropical germ diseases and when the 
resources of the temperate zones aie taxed to capacity by rapidly 
growing populations. 

Therefore in a realm so vast as that stretching from the Rio Grande 
to Tierra del Fuego, the home of 20,000,000 people of white blood, 
of nearly 20,000,000 Indians and negroes, and of 35,000,000 more of 
mixed blood, it should not surprise us to find problems of practical 
interest to the whole world and of paramount interest to the United 
States. 

THE UNITED STATES AND LATIN AMERICA 

To every thoughtful person in the United States, Latin- American Need for a 
relations and problems appear the more important because of past ''*^J°* 
diplomatic and commercial neglect. Though the people of the under- 
northern republic call their Latin neighbors "Americans," make ^**° "^^ 
much of the protective value of the Monroe Doctrine, and lay par- 
ticular stress on the good effects of closer commercial ties, the 
United States must face the cold fact, whether agreeable or not, that 
satisfactory relations have not yet been estabhshed. The ties appear 
to be artificial. There is lacking the bond that is in general the 
strongest in the world — a common language. Then there are differ- 
ences of race which are even more nearly fundamental. They mani- 
fest themselves in manners and dress, in Hterature and ethics, in 
sports, and in social and pofitical ideals. 

559 



560 



The New World 



I 




Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 561 

Finally, there is the instinctive and world-wide antagonism spring- 
ing from the fear and dislike of the weak for the strong. In the 
case of Latin America this fear rests upon a foundation of fact as 
well as upon a measure of instinctive antagonism due to unlike race 
and lesser commercial and military power. The steady growth of 
the United States in territory and influence, mainly among former 
Latin-American possessions, naturally arouses anxiety as to future 
advances. The following table reveals the surprising fact that the 
United States has extended its influence and control more rapidly 
since its annexation of Hawaii (not to mention the earher acquisition 
of territory originally Latin- American in the southwest) than any other 
great power, even imperialist Russia. 



Name 


Date 


Relationship 


Area in 
Sq. Mi. 


Population 


Hawaii 

Cuba 

Porto Rico 

Philippine Islands . . . 

Guam 

Tutuila (Samoa) . . . 

Panama 

Santo Domingo .... 

Haiti 

Nicaragua 

Virgin Islands .... 


1898 
1898 
1898 
1898 
1898 
1899 

1903 
1907 
1916 
1915 
1913 
1916 

1917 


Annexed 

Virtual protectorate 
Annexed after war with Spain 
Annexed after war with Spain 
Annexed after war with Spain 
Annexed by treaty with Great 

Britain and Germany 
General supervision 
Supervision of finances 
MiUtary administration 
Supervision of finances 
Virtual protectorate 
Grant of canal rights and 

naval bases to U. S. 
Ownership by purchase 
Totals 


6,450 

44,150 

3,600 

115,025 

210 

77 
32,400 
18,500 

11,000 
49,500 

132 


250,000 

2,900,000 

1,250,000 

8,500,000 

14,500 

7,250 
450,000 
955,000 

2,500,000 
746,000 

26,000 




281,044 


17,598,750 



The United States is classified as a democracy, and it has in recent American 
years disavowed imperialist designs and even protested against such f^ praS 
designs on the part of European powers ; yet the fact is that the 
tendency to expansion has been shown in an emphatic manner from 
the beginnings of settlement in colonial days, through the period of 
the Louisiana Purchase and the annexation of Florida, during the 
period immediately before and after the Mexican War, down to the 
present. The protectorate over Haiti assumed in 1915, the treaty 
with Nicaragua in 1916, whereby the United States obtained for 99 
years the right to construct a canal through Nicaraguan territory, 
and the purchase of the Virgin Islands in 1917, are merely the latest 
in a long series of advances. 

The events referred to above are facts that impress the Latin- Amer- Basis of 
lean countries more powerfuUy than expressions of good wiU and devo- **p*°^**"* 



56^ 



The New World 



Opposition 
to expan- 
sion a new 
experience 
for the 
United 
States 



Coopera- 
tion an 
aspiration 
rather 
than a 
reality 



I 



tion to democratic ideals. In part the expansion of the United States 
is a manifestation of the ahnost universal land-hunger of the peoples 
of the world ; in part it is an expression of that pioneering instinct 
which has ever driven the people of the United States beyond their 
territorial frontiers ; in part it is a conviction of the superiority of 
American institutions over those they displace in some Latin-Amer- 
ican countries that are too weak and backward to manage themselves ; 
and in part it is a recognition of the commercial advantages that are 
naturally associated with a higher degree of pohtical control. 

Whatever European nations might have preferred to do, they have 
in practice — at times under direct compulsion — recognized the Mon- 
roe Doctrine and left the United States free to pursue its southward 
advance ; but such expansion has in recent years evoked a certain 
hostility among the Latin-American states, a hostility based on the 
assumption that their economic and political hberties were at stake ; 
and the United States is therefore confronted with direct and powerful 
political opposition for the first time since it embarked upon its policy 
of expansion overseas. Here we have a problem of the first rank. For 
the people of the United States are as unknown to themselves as they 
are to the rest of the world. They do not know how they will take 
interference with their pohcy of expansion, for in that expansion they 
have not had, so far, a single misadventure. Wliile such an experi- 
ence has left them in an amiable attitude toward others and has given 
them a generous appreciation of the point of view of others, there is 
danger in that they do not know what fires of passion may be 
lighted by active opposition. 

The eagerness of the United States to cooperate with Latin- American 
repubhcs has shown itself in the organization of the Pan American 
Union, in friendly interest in the once active Central American Court 
of Justice, and in acceptance of the ofi'ers of the ABC powers — 
Argentina, Brazil, and Chile — in the Mexican trouble of 1916 ; but 
it is not certain that cooperation is equally acceptable to the Latin 
Americans, who have a quite different character and a markedly 
different social order, and whose governments, though patterned 
after that of the United States, are actually run in a quite different 
way. Moreover, they cannot help seeing that the history of the last 
twenty-five years shows the United States as an expansionist power 
of rapidly growing strength, with a population that now numbers 
105,000,000, or more than the population of the entire group of twenty 
Latin- American nations. They reahze that in any cooperative enter- 
prise the United States would play the dominant part. 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 563 




Fig. 273. The city and harbor of Charlotte Amelie, Virgin Islands, now an American possession. 



Then, too, there are marked differences of opinion between the Differences 
people of the United States and those of Latin- American countries as ^^th"^^^*^* 
to the social and poUtical problems of the day. To take a single color line 
instance, there are great differences with respect to colored popula- 
tions. The tendency to intermarry with the native races is a marked 
characteristic of the Latin Americans. In Chile whole sections of the 
former Indian population have become mixed with the whites, and 
though the Indian element is strongly marked, there is no longer any 
recognition of the existence of the Indian in those particular sections, 
the population calHng itself Chilean. Similarly, a large mixed class 
exists in Peru and Bolivia, to cite two more illustrations out of many. 
In short, the barriers of race are far less marked in Latin America than 
in the United States. 

There can be recognized in parts of Latin America a considerable Decline of 
decline in the quality of the population. Our common thought is and^poS 
that the world is improving ; but as a matter of fact portions of it cai ideals 
have actually lost ground. This is particularly true in Haiti and 
Santo Domingo, in parts of Central America, in Venezuela, and in 
Mexico. In actual practice democratic principles have been left far 



564 



The New World 



Anxiety 
respecting 
encroach- 
ments of 
rival 
powers 



Develop- 
ment in 
tropical 
lands a 
task for 
progressive 
peoples 



behind. There are a few countries in which military dictators are 
in actual control, instead of truly representative governments. Pro- 
fessing the same general political principles, they show the utmost 
divergence of pohtical practice. 

Should there be increasing weakness on the part of small and pohti- 
cally disintegrating states, the possibihties of encroachment by powers 
with imperialist designs would require consideration. It is feared 
by the neighbors of the United States that the impulse to dominate 
the Caribbean and the Pacific will grow stronger, and may lead even- 
tually to sovereign control. One argument always stands ready for 
effective use : that only in growth can guarantees be found that 
colonies and naval stations of other powers will not be estabUshed near 
the shores of the United States to threaten its security as well as its 
peace. This consideration explains the purchase of the Danish West 
Indies during the World War, the protectorate over Haiti, the special 
arrangements with Cuba (the Piatt Amendment), with Santo Domingo 
(a receivership amounting to a protectorate), with Panama (direct 
ownership of the Canal Zone and special treaty arrangements with the 
RepubUc of Panama), and with Nicaragua (the purchase of canal 
rights and the regulation of her financial affairs). If the United States 
allows financial operations to be carried on and obhgations to be 
incurred in Latin America by its commercial rivals, protectorates and 
naval stations of its own will be the natural outcome ; for these rivals 
look to the United States to guarantee the integrity of Latin- American 
states included under the general protection of the Monroe Doctrine. 

The United States is also impelled to expand commercially in the 
part of Latin America nearest to it by the necessities of modern 
civilization, which require tropical products in increasing quantities. 
Were tropical America occupied by more progressive peoples than those 
which race, history, and cUmate have conspired to develop there, 
economic relations might be built upon a basis of ordinary exchange, 
as between France and America. Instead there is a population locally 
incapable of protecting itself or of managing its affairs, and in a few 
places in a state of pohtical and economic dechne. Only under the 
stimulus of necessity and through the influx of the agents and capital 
of temperate lands are the tropical products of weak countries made 
available. With the importation of aggressive men and capital into 
the tropics goes the importation first of economic and then of political 
systems. 

The only serious fear connected with such an importation is that 
it may lead to the exploitation of unwilling peoples by unfair means. 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 565 

Political discontent and even war have sprung again and again from Dangers 
this imposition of ideas and power upon other peoples. Such im- ^g^^en 
position is not restricted to tropical America, but is world-wide ; it ^^^^^ «po° 
is associated with the extraordinary expansion of the political and peoples 
economic systems of the densely populated industrial nations ot the 
north temperate zone into the tropical lands of America, Africa, and 
the East and West Indies. 

COMPETITION FOR SOUTH AMERICAN TRADE 

Though serious efforts have been made to turn the tide of Latin Tides of 
American students and travelers toward the United States, it must business** 
be said that it still flows far more strongly toward Europe, and par- ^ward 
ticularly to France. For the Latin Americans find that the older 
cultures of Europe more nearly meet their taste in manners and 
accord better with their point of view, their philosophy, and their 
ideals. This congeniality of mind and the keener needs of the 
European merchants for raw materials (as compared with the United 
States) have conspired with the extensive type of South American 
production to put the commerce of Latin America very much into 
the hands of the commercial and financial interests of western 
Europe. To this end also has contributed powerfuUy the better 
shipping service to South America from England and France. 

A prominent Briton wrote in 1913 that one of the eleven main British and 
probable causes of future wars m which Great Britain might take ^^"tf° 
part would be tionfor 

Latin- 

" . . . any attempt of the United States to exercise peculiar polit- trade 
ical or commercial privileges in South America, east of the Panama 
Canal Zone, and in general any attempt on the part of an outside 
power to interfere with the independence of the South American 
republics ; or a disposition on the part of any South American state 
to confer peculiar privileges in commerce on the subjects of any for- 
eign power to the detriment of the free- trade principle." 

It IS important to note that the writer does not include Central 
America and Mexico in his hst, and it is equally important to note 
that he speaks as a representative of a free-trade nation. He has 
given us, therefore, both a broad poHtical statement related to the 
independence of the tjouth American states and a narrower statement 
relating to trade arrangements that shall give the British merchant 
the same chance as the American. 

Great Britain is by far the largest investor in South American 



I 



56Q 



The New World 



British 
commercial 
interests 
in South 
America 



• American 
business 
interests in 
Latin 
America 



Business 
combina- 
tions for 
foreign 
trade 



enterprises : her citizens own large concessions in the INlexican oil 
fields and in Colombia ; her railway financiers built the Argentine 
railways ; and for a time she was the largest owner among foreign 
nitrate companies in northern Chile. The Peruvian Corporation 
(British), wliich has almost sovereign rights in Peru, temporarily 
holds the rich guano concessions of the Chinchas Islands and owns 
the Southern Railway, from Mollendo and Arequipa to Lake Titicaca 
and Cuzco. 

The chief advances made in the trade of South America have not 
yet brought the United States into acute conflict with British in- 
terests, but they are likely to do so in the near future unless there 
is agreement with Great Britain on a common policy. American 
capitalists have very largely increased their railway holdings and 
will tend in the future to have a stronger hold upon land transport, 
which wiU greatly stimulate American industrial enterprises. Large 
American export houses have established themselves in the main 
coast ports. A chain of banking houses has been founded to offer 
banking facihties to the American merchant and investor. At Chu- 
quicamata, in northern Chile, American interests have acquired 
the largest deposit of commercial copper known in South America. 
An American firm owns the rich copper and silver mines of Cerro de 
Pasco in Peru, and those of Braden in Chile. During the World War 
many manufactured goods formerly obtained from Europe were 
imported from the United States, and some of that war-time trade 
the United States has held, owing to improved knowledge of the needs 
of South American people and their peculiar desires and to the better 
freight rates that the new cargo carriers in the South American trade 
were able to ofl^er for a time. 

Of great influence in future world trade, and especiafly in United 
States trade with Latin America, is the Webb Law, passed by Con- 
gress on 10 April 1918, which permits a combination of business firms 
engaged in export trade. Formerly such combination was forbidden 
by the Sherman and other anti-trust laws. Under the Webb law it 
may be expected that American export trade will be promoted. Al- 
ready some of the large manufacturing, banking, and exporting firms 
have laid plans for the pooling of their business and the development of 
American export trade on a great scale, in order that through coopera- 
tion rather than competition they may hold and develop a larger 
share of the world's trade. 

The growth of Spanish interests in Latin America was very rapid 
from 1914 to 1919, partly for sentimental and poHtical reasons and 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 567 

partly for business reasons, seeing that Spain, by engaging in trade Spanish 
as a neutral country during the war period, greatly increased her bank iStin ^*^ "^ 
reserves. After the war she appointed a committee of engineers at ^^^"ca 
Madrid to investigate the possibilities of commercial expansion with 
the Spanish-speaking repubhcs of Latin America, with the object of 
promoting closer business and political relations. There is to be a 
permanent exhibit of Latin- American products at Madrid. 

But in spite of the growth of Spanish, Italian, and French trade 
in Latin America, the interests of the United States clash with those 
of no European power save Great Britain. Let us follow this fact 
into Central America and see some of its .consequences there. 

In 1850 the United States signed a treaty with Great Britain, American 
called the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, by which the United States agreed Sn^cenTrai 
not to construct an isthmian canal save as a joint enterprise with American 
Great Britain. But the growth of Caribbean interests led to the 
abrogation of that treaty in 1901 (by the terms of the Hay-Paunce- 
fote treaty) and left the United States free to construct a canal by 
itself, provided that the canal be open to the ships of all nations on 
the same terms. In fact, European countries have looked to the gov- 
ernment of the United States to maintain order and guarantee the 
security of their loans in Central American states, and tliis the United 
States cannot do unless it occupies a privileged position and holds the 
main strategic points. During the past fifteen years the United States 
has frequently landed and even maintained marines in Honduras and 
Nicaragua, and has taken over indefinitely the functions of the default- 
ing government in Santo Domingo. In September 1915 an agreement 
with Haiti provided that the United States may take such steps as may 
be necessary to maintain an adequate government. The United States 
also undertook to supervise the financial and mihtary affairs of Haiti. 
Pershing's mihtary expedition into Mexico in 1916 was in fine with 
the American custom of maintaining order, or at least taking the 
lead in quelling disorder, in the parts of Latin America that he 
nearby. 

Opposed to this supervisory policy of the United States are large Attitude of 
and influential sections of South America, and these sections have \^^"^: 
followed their big neighbor's behavior with the closest attention, nations 
Chile has been watchful and suspicious, because the United States u^^e^ *^^ 
befriended her rival, Peru, in the bitter war of 1879-1883. The man- states not 
ner in which the Panama Canal Zone was acquired offended Colombia friendly 
deeply, and it will be long before that country is in truth the friend 
of the United States. Though belated, American action in recognizing 



568 The New World 

the neglect of Colombia's interests in 1903 by the agreement of 1921 to 
pay her $25,000,000 and grant special transportation privileges in 
the Canal Zone is at least a necessary first step in the direction of 
better relations. The United States and Colombia are naturally 
closely allied through the large trade, and especially the large fruit 
business, which is conducted in the Caribbean coast region. 

THE MEXICAN PROBLEM 

Results of The unsettled state of Mexico offers the problem of most direct 
in Mexico and keen interest to the United States today. Border populations 
must not be in constant danger of raids by bandits from the southern 
side of the Rio Grande. Investments in mines, oil fields, and cattle 
ranches, if these have been honestly acquired and administered, 
should have security. In Mexico thousands of people have been 
killed by revolution and banditry, thousands of others impoverished, 
political opponents impMSoned, and foreign debts neglected. The 
total number of Americans killed on the border or in Mexico in recent 
years runs into the hundreds. The number of Americans in Mexico 
was reduced, chiefly by emigration to escape death or avoid the con- 
fiscation of property, from 75,000 in 1910 or 1911 to 12,000 by Sep- 
tember 1919. American losses in Mexico of all kinds during the past 
few years have a total value of nearly half a billion of dollars. 

It remains to be seen whether Mexican elements can restore Mexico 
to the honorable position that she so long held. To employ force 
would be a painful alternative for the United States and would pro- 
duce a fresh crop of suspicions among those Latin Americans who 
heretofore have not rehnquished the hope that America desires to 
avoid the absorption of small and weak states even when they are 
dishonest and provocative in international conduct. 

These are problems which cannot be solved by saying that capi- 
talists, large landowners, and corrupt government officials once held 
the mass of the Mexican people in economic bondage. Unless the 
whole structure of the organized world is to be destroyed and the 
worship of chaos to begin, with such suffering as mankind has not 
yet known, a change of government cannot be made the excuse for 
repudiating debts and disclaiming all moral obhgations. 

THE WEST INDIES 

At the entrance to the Gulf of Mexico, there begins a chain of 
islands that runs to the east until it makes a sharp turn and curves 
southward to the coast of Venezuela. The larger islands in this are 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 569 

— Cuba, Jamaica, Haiti, and Porto Rico — lie nearest Mexico and 
the United States. On the outer side of the arc, and near Florida, 
lie the Bahama Islands, almost parallel with Cuba and Haiti. Next 
to the Bahama Islands come the Leeward Islands, which are on the 
turn of the curve downward toward South America. Next, running 
almost directly south, comes the chain of small islands, the Windward > 
Islands, that ends with Trinidad near the mouth of the Orinoco. 

The largest and most valuable islands of the entire group of the West Foreign 
Indies were in Spanish possession from the Age of Discovery. Some control of 
of the smaller islands, particularly those farthest east, were transferred Indian 
from power to power in the days of the struggle, first between Dutch ^^'^"'^^ 
and English, later between English and French, for colonial and 
naval supremacy. Up to 1898 possession of the islands had remained 
settled for some time : Cuba and Porto Rico were Spanish ; the 
Bahamas and Jamaica were English ; on the island of Haiti two 
republics had been established, Haiti and the Dominican Republic; 
of the Leeward Islands one small group — the Virgin Islands — was 
Danish, and the others were divided about equally between France 
and Great Britain, while the Windward Islands were entirely Eng- 
lish. The Dutch also held a smaller group, one of wliich is Curagao, 
to the west of the Windward Islands near the Gulf of Venezuela. 

Since 1898 there have been several changes in the ownership of these 
islands. Cuba is now a republic practically under United States pro- 
tection, as are also the republics of Haiti and Santo Domingo. Porto 
Rico has become a part of United States territory. The latest change 
is the purchase from Denmark in 1917 of the Virgin Islands, the 
group inunediately to the east of Porto Rico, by the United States. 

The purchase of the Virgin Islands from Denmark, hke the Panama special 
Canal transaction in 1903, notified the world that America regarded »»itere£ts 
herself as having special and rightful interests in the Caribbean and united 
along its shores. In a similar case, the general recognition of the ^^^^ 
British protectorate in Egypt in 1919 acknowledged Great Britain's 
special and rightful interest in the route to India and especially the 
Suez Canal. Experience with Spain in Cuba before 1898 justified 
the United States in undertaking to maintain order since that time 
in the whole of the American Mediterranean. 

In the days of saiHng vessels the presence of European powers TheCarib- 
in the island groups to the southeast, while sometimes noted as a bean a 
disadvantage, was not felt by the United States to be a source of great speci^° 
danger. Swifter means of communication increased the fear that a '^^^^^^^^ 

« , I'll 1 Amencans 

foreign power might use the islands as a base of attack on the United 



570 



The New World 



States. With the acquisition of the Panama Canal, the presence of 
other powers in the chain of islands separating the Atlantic Ocean 
from the Caribbean Sea became troublesome, a possible menace to 
the safety of the canal. 

The use that was made of the submarine by Germany during the 
late war and the powerful strides in aerial navigation and radio com- 
munication have greatly increased the width of those border protective 
zones that all commercial nations seek to control. 



Boundary 
disputes 
due to 
ignorance 
as well as 
to ambition 



ChUe- 
Argentina 
dispute of 
1900 



Bolivian 
disputes 
with Peru 
and Brazil 



FRONTIER ZONES OF FRICTION IN LATIN AMERICA 

Every boundary dispute is a possible cause of war, and boundary 
disputes grow out of ignorance as well as ambition. "Frontiers are 
indeed the razor's edge on which hang suspended the modern issues 
of war or peace, of life or death for nations." The unsettled bound- 
aries of the Latin-American nations are therefore matters of general 
concern. If the frontiers of the La tin- American states were well- 
known through exploratory surveys, and if their history were care- 
fully worked out, an impartial tribunal could very soon make a de- 
cision that would commend itself to the world, if not to the nations in 
the dispute. One of the prime functions of an international court of 
justice will be the settlement of boundary disputes by peaceful means, 
making use of the resources of geographical research and exploration. 

The proof of this argument is found in the settlement of Latin- 
American boundary disputes in the past. In 1900 Chile and Argen- 
tina were on the verge of war over the interpretation of the treaty of 
1881, which defined the boundary in Patagonia as "the crest and 
watershed" of the high cordillera, though the divide between the Atlan- 
tic and Pacific drainages in places lies not on the crest of the Andes 
but east of them. As neither side knew the country thoroughly, 
they agreed to send a party of surveyors under Colonel Sir Thomas 
Holdich, and within a year an award was made, on the basis of topo- 
graphic surveys, that has satisfied both sides. 

The Peruvian-Bolivian boundary north of Lake Titicaca has had 
a similar history. In 1910 the newspapers of La Paz and Lima were 
full of war talk. In 1911 a party of Engfish surveyors was in the 
field to establish a line that has since proved satisfactory. The 
boundary between Bolivia and Brazil in the heavily wooded country 
of the southwestern Amazon plains was settled and surveyed after 
armed forces had faced each other across the Acre River for months. 

What unsettled boundaries remain to be surveyed.*^ Where are 
the frontier zones of friction .►^ What are the cliief differences of 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 571 




Fig. 274. The zones of friction in South America: 1, the Gran Chaco; 2, Tacna-Arica, Tara- 
paed, and Antofagasta ; 3, the junction of Ecuador, Colombia, and Peru ; 4, 5, 6, minor disputed 
areas in the Colombia-Venezuela frontier. There is also the dispute over the boundary m the 
La Plata estuary (Fig. 280). 



572 



The New World 



\ 



Value of 
the almost 
uninhabited 
desert of 
northern 
Chile 




Fig. 275.^ Production areas in the nitrate fields of northern 
Chile. From Economic Geology, April-May 1920. 



opinion as to land titles 
and resources? In the 
succeeding pages are dis- 
cussed those boundary 
disputes that have seri- 
ously threatened or at 
this moment are threat- 
ening the peace of Latin 
America. Some of them 
involve vast wealth ; 
others affect few people 
and small tracts of terri- 
tory. 

The Tacna-Arica Bound- 
ary Dispute 

The greatest terri- 
torial dispute pending 
in Latin America, the 
one most interesting in 
its history and its 
economic bearings, and 
most likely to lead to 
war, is that between 
Chile and Peru in the 
Tacna-Arica district. 
Before 1879 the southern 
frontier of Peru included 
the province of Tara- 
paca, and Bolivia held 
the province of Anto- 
fagasta on the south. 
Within Tarapaca lay 
much of the exceedingly 
rich nitrate deposit that, 
until the discovery of 
the process for the re- 
covery of nitrogen' from 
the ail a few years ago, 
produced 99 per cent of 
the world's supply. 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 573 



2 

, J 


J 
-1 


J 
/I 




/ 


/ 



For three hundred years the frontiers of - t i war of 

Peru, Bohvia, and Chile remained ill-defined / the Pacific, 

because almost no people hved in the region ; „ 
indeed, most of it is utterly desert. It is 
partly owing to the extreme aridity that nitrate 
salts have accumulated there. By 1850 these 
salts had become commercially useful and, with I 
the marked advances of industrial chemistry 
(1860-1880), they had become so valuable that | 
they formed a great natural endowment to the 
country owning them. • Naturally, this state 
of affairs led to dispute, and, in 1879, to 
war. Chile had a powerful fleet, Peru had 
inferior ships of war, and the sea is the 
great highway along the west coast of South . 
America, where a stretch of desert sixteen Fig. 276. The production of 
hundred miles long makes land travel arduous pedodl ^'Viguret fo^isso-Tssg 
and costly. Within a year the Chilean army ^^e from Paz Soidan, Geografia 

, , IT- n 1 t^ T^ del Peru; for 1840-1894 from 

had captured Lima, all the coast ports ot Peru Ortuzar, cmu of To-day, for 
were destroyed or in Chilean hands, and the J895-i9i4 from f Lopez 

'' _ ' Loayza, La Protincia dc lara- 

Chilean government was in possession of the poca, and from current numbers 

. , , /-> 1 1 1 • T r^i '11 111 • of the South American Journal. 

nitrate nelds, which Chile has held ever since. 

Bolivia offered very little resistance and until recently accepted 

exclusion from the sea with only nominal protest. 

By the treaty of Ancon, signed in 1883, Chile agreed to hold a Promised 
plebiscite and thus let the inhabitants of Tacna-Arica — the part of ^0^^^^*^^^ 
the captured territory that is unquestionably Peruvian — decide chiie 
whether Chile or Peru should own the region. Once in possession, 
however, Chile could not let go her hold. The plebiscite, for one 
reason after another, has never been held. In the meantime diplo- 
matic relations between the two countries have been suspended 
again and again, there have been frequent local mobilizations and 
strategic disposals of naval units, and, worst of all, serious perse- 
cutions of Peruvians. Thousands of persons have been mobbed and 
robbed and driven into Peru. In 1910 Chile expelled all Peruvian 
priests and closed their churches. The latest of these persecutions 
took place in 1919, when Chilean mobs closed Peruvian stores in the 
towns of Arica and Tacna and Chilean authorities expelled influen- 
tial Peruvian residents. By way of retaliation, Peruvian workmen 
go on strike frequently, refusing to unload Chilean steamers. The 
two countries have remained in a warlike state, and but for the 



574 



The New World 



Claim of 
Bolivia to a 
highway to 
the sea 




terrible expense of war and the in- 
fluence of business men and foreign 
diplomats they would long since have 
reopened the struggle. 

Into the conflict between Chile and 
Peru for the possession of the Tacna- 
Arica territory there has been intro- 
duced a third element — landlocked 
Bolivia's claim for a commercial outlet 
at the port of Arica. Bolivia (with 
Chilean cooperation) has built a rail- 
road from La Paz direct to the sea, 
across lofty mountains and barren 
desert to Arica, and now claims the 
right to have an outlet to the sea and 
to a strip of land on either side, so as 
to take control of the railroad out of 
foreign hands. That much seems to 
be needed to give this landlocked state, 
the only interior country of South 
America, except Paraguay, undisputed 
access to the sea roads of the Pacific. 
If the land north of the protecting strip 
were returned to Peru and Peruvian 
citizens were once more repatriated, the 

the war of 1879 between Chile on the one matter WOuld be finally Settled. This 
hand and Peru and Bolivia on the other, , . i ^ • r^i -i • . 

Antofagasta was a Bolivian province and SOlutlOU WOUld glVC Chile SOVCrClgUty 

'^e^'ri or''''^ ""''"^ Tacna-Arica were Peruvian ^^^j. ^J^g greater part of the territory 

captured in 1879-1880 and would es- 
tablish her frontier 200 miles south of its present position. The 
population of Tacna-Arica is about 38,000, of whom two thirds live 
in Tacna and one third lives in Arica. 

The rumor that Bolivia had agreed with Chile to give up Bolivian 
claims to Antofagasta in return for Chilean assistance in gaining Arica 
aroused Peru to vehement protest that culminated in an exchange of 
sharp notes in March 1920, in which both reviewed their claims. 
Bolivia insists that her right to Arica goes back to colonial days 
and also to the early years of her independence, specificaUy 1826. 
Peru also asserts an historical claim and declares she will not have 
peace until the dispute is settled by arbitration or through the instru- 
mentality of the international court of justice of the League of Nations. 



Fig. 277. Location and railway connec- 
tions of the Tacna-Arica, Tarapacd, and 
Antofagasta districts. The focus of the 
present difficulty is Tacna-Arica, where 
Bolivia seeks a territorial outlet, or "win- 
dow on the sea," and where Peru insists 
on complete ownership in view of Chile's 
broken promise to hold a plebiscite accord- 
ing to the treaty of Ancon, 1883. Before 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 575 




o 



S S 









03 p 

S o 



S^ 






576 



The New World 




Fubllslura' Fholo Service 
Fig. 279. The Morro de Arica, on the summit of which in 1880 was fought one of the decisive 
battles of the war between Chile and Peru. 



The La Plata Estuary 

A dispute still unsettled between Argentina and Uruguay involves 
an artificial channel 120 miles long and extending from a point 
northeast of Buenos Aires to English Bank at the mouth of the 
La Plata estuary. This is the main outlet of Argentine commerce. 
In 1828 Argentina and Uruguay agreed that the natural channel of 
the Uruguay and the northeastern bank of the Bio de la Plata should 
be the frontier of Uruguay. Uruguay now claims the median line 
of the estuary, which would give her control of the channel built, 
lighted, and buoyed by Argentina and maintained at Argentina's 
expense. The estuary is so shallow, with a depth varying from 8 
to 18 feet, and the shoals are so extensive, that navigation is limited 
to an artificial channel. Paraguay, Bolivia, and Brazil also are 
interested in the matter, because an increasing portion of their interior 
commerce must pass by this route. Questions of law and of inter- 
national policy as to problems of this class remain to be determined 
before the dispute can be settled. Particularly important in the 
settlement is the question of the proper present-day limits of so-called 
territorial waters, in past practice a three-mile zone (Fig. 280). 

The Bolivia-Paraguay Boundary 

Bolivia and Paraguay have a dispute in the Gran Chaco region, 
which lies between the Pilcomayo River on the south and the Paraguay 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 577 

River on the east. The disputed zone is virgin grassland in part and 
will have high commercial value in a short time. Bolivia has occupied 
the right bank of the Paraguay River in the Gran Chaco, establishing 
a fort and telegraph station and maintaining troops there. She has 
effectively occupied the country for many years, one of her main 
streams of commerce passing across the Gran Chaco to the Paraguay 
River. On the other hand, Paraguay claims territory west of the 
Paraguay River to the limits of her old colonial boundaries. She has 
also granted or sold foreign concessions on the west side of the Paraguay 
River for the estabUshment of sawmills (for quebracho wood) and 
cattle ranches. At a few places she has penetrated at least a hundred 
miles west of the river. 

In 1913 the two nations agreed to annul all former arrangements 
and to try to settle affairs directly between themselves ; if they 
failed, they were to submit the matter to arbitration. The boundary 
is still in dispute. 

The Peru-Bolivia Boundary 

The boundary dispute between Peru and Bolivia appears now 
to be happily disposed of. It concerned the region north of Lake 
Titicaca, over the eastern Andes and into the lowland forests at the 
edge of the Amazon basin, the cordilleran section including the valu- 
able alpaca pastures of Apolobamba. In 1910 the trouble was so 
serious that both governments mobilized forces at the frontier. 

The boundary survey was begun in 1911 and concluded in 1913 by 
English surveyors. The two countries agreed that any dispute be- 
tween the commissions of their respective goverimaents should be 
submitted, without the right of an appeal, to the President of the 
Royal Geographical Society of London. The reports were pubhshed 
in 1918. 

The Colombia-Venezuela Boundary 

The dispute between Colombia and Venezuela concerns an almost 
uninhabited country near the headwaters of the Orinoco. It has 
arisen because of the indefinite texts of the various treaties, the 
changing fortunes of the frontier towns, and the overlapping juris- 
diction of the local or district governments. In the course of the 
attempts made by the national governments concerned to settle their 
disputes, technical commissions have studied and partly demarcated 
the position of the line in the field. The dispute has been reduced 
to three small areas in which the population is so limited and the 
resources at present are so unimportant, that there would be little 



578 



The New World 




Fig. 280. The disputed entrance to Buenos Aires. Uruguay wishes to establish the median 
line of the La Plata as a boundary with Argentina. This would give her possession of the ship 
channel near Montevideo and above Colonia. The channel was dredged and buoyed and is 
maintained by Argentina at great expense, owing to the large amount of river silt constantly 
being deposited in the estuary. Hitherto the boundary has run close_ to the northeastern bank 
of La Plata. The broken lines represent ship channels. 

difficulty in settling the matter were it not for the fact that in one or 
two places a good deal of traffic crosses the boundary. There are no 
foreign concessions guaranteed by either government in the disputed 
territory. 

The Colombia- Ecuador-Peru Boundary 

The area in dispute between Peru and Colombia is shown in Figure 
274. If one or the other party should secure its full claim, or if a com- 
promise should be arranged on a common line of division, Ecuador 
would be reduced to a mere coastal strip. A large part of the disputed 
region, while densely forested country with a scant Indian popula- 
tion, has become important recently because of its rubber resources. 
At one time or another Peruvian, Ecuadorian, or Colombian officials 
have nominally controlled the same region. 

In 1900 a Peruvian navigation office was established on the Napo, 
and from that time Peru took active steps to extend her authority 
over this river, as well as over the Putumayo and Caqueta rivers, 
establishing custom houses and military posts, and offering armed 
resistance to the Colombians who attempted to navigate them. In 
1910 there was a quarrel amounting practically to a battle between 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 579 

the armed forces of the two republics. In 1911 the two agreed to 
make no further attacks upon their respective settlements, since 
which time neither country could enforce the law without armed 
opposition from the citizens of the other. 

In 1916 (Treaty of Bogota) Ecuador and Colombia came to an 
agreement on their common boundary, and this agreement has sub- 
sequently been confirmed (1920) and the boundary demarcated. The 
eastern extremity of the line, however, cannot be regarded as settled 
until confirmed by Peru, since her claims overlap those of both Co- 
lombia and Ecuador. 



The Guatemala- Honduras Boundary 

The boundary between Guatemala and Honduras was never de- Govem- 
termined by surveyors except over a short distance, and the admin- JJadiion 
istration of the frontier zone was left to chance or tradition. Some leading to 
towns had been under Guatemaltecan, others under Honduranean of war ^* 
governors for many years. The ecclesiastical districts did not always 
conform to these arrangements, nor was the political boundary always 
a fine separating citizens of Honduras and Guatemala. Some of 
the frontier land was mountainous, with swift encanyoned streams; 
some of it was low, hot, swampy, and unhealthful. Government by 
tradition might have gone on for many years if the low country 
had not become valuable to banana-growers. The United Fruit 
Company, an American corporation with property at various points 
between northern Colombia and Guatemala, has established a line 
of steamers to many ports that are the outlet for the banana lands of 
the Caribbean. The company desired concessions, that is, the right 
to own and cultivate plantations and erect port works. Suddenly 
the lowlands on the frontier became valuable. Each government 
was eager to draw the boundary to its own advantage. 

In earher times war would surely have ensued, and it seemed Arwtra- 
indeed very difficult to avoid. Both goverimients were persuaded a Gu"tfn!iia 
few years ago to submit their claims to the Secretary oi State of Honduras 
the United States for recommendation. The first necessity was a ^°^^^^^ 
survey to clear away ignorance and establish the facts of history and 
of actual administration during past years as well as the nature and 
value of the economic resources involved. The work was placed in 
the hands of a scientific party administered by the American Geo- 
graphical Society of New York. A definitive settlement is yet to 
be made. 



580 



TJie New World 



Two 

arbitral 

decisions 



Responsi- 
bilities 
of the 
United 
States 



The Panama-Costa Rica Boundary 

The governments of Colombia and Costa Rica, wishing to settle 
an old frontier dispute, agreed to submit their rival claims to Presi- 
dent Loubet of France for arbitration (1900). The appUcation of 
President Loubet's decision proved difficult, owing to lack of detailed 
knowledge of the wooded and partly swampy terrain and the different 
interpretations that might be placed upon the language of the award. 
After Panama gained its independence (1903) by secession from 
Colombia, the old boundary dispute became an issue between itself 
and Costa Rica. In 1905 there was concluded a treaty between 
Costa Rica and Panama which sought to amend, in the interest of 
both parties, the award of 1900; but unexpected difficulties arose, 
and it was agreed that the question should be submitted to Chief 
Justice White of the United States Supreme Court for arbitration. 
The disputed points related to that part of the boimdary between 
the central watershed and the Atlantic coast, and of that part Uttle 
was known. Once again a territorial dispute depended in large 
part upon ignorance of local geography. Unfortunately the contest- 
ants could not more readily agree to accept the decision of Chief 
Justice White in 1913 than that of President Loubet in 1900, or their 
own partial agreement respecting the southwestern end of the bound- 
ary in 1910. Long negotiation having failed to compose the differ- 
ences, resort was made in late February 1921 to threats and warhke 
preparations, in spite of the fact that both countries are members 
of the League of Nations, whose covenant provides the means of 
peaceful settlement in such cases. 

The problem is compUcated by the responsibilities of the United 
States to maintain order in Panama and to guarantee its independ- 
ence in accordance with the Canal Zone purchase agreement of 1904. 
At that time the government of Panama, needing protection in view 
of its obvious weakness and its recent secession from Colombia, was 
wiUing to assent to restrictions which it was later to repent. Re- 
peated attempts have been made to secure freedom from full Amer- 
ican control, but without success. The United States is therefore 
confronted with the possibility of direct interference not only with 
Panama, but also with Costa Rica should the latter attempt aggres- 
sive acts against Panama. On the other hand, to resist such acts 
is to invite the criticism of Latin- American countries. After hostil- 
ities between Panama and Costa Rica had actually begun, though on 
a very small scale, the American goverimient pressed the issue of 



Latin-American Trade and Boundary Disputes 581 

peace March (1921) and the trouble subsided at least temporarily. 
The problem illustrates anew the dehcate position of the United 
States as a consequence of its advance into the Caribbean and the 
grave issues that are Mnked with the ownership and protection of the 
Panama Canal, in every way vital to its commerce and defense. 

The quarrel of these two states illustrates the difficulties in the way Attempts at 
of confederating the Central-American countries, as proposed in 1907 confedera- 
and again in 1920. Interstate trade between the small countries of centrai- 
Central America is greatly hampered by frontier regulations, espe- American 
cially irksome on account of rapidly changing national policies and 
governments and the inexperienced character of the officials. The 
first attempt was made on the initiative of Mexico and the United 
States ; the second attempt was in response to a circular telegram from 
Salvador to the other republics of Central America, suggesting a con- 
ference for the purpose of unifying their constitutions, of equalizing 
customs and moneys, and of adopting one national shield and flag. 
While the idea of the conference was accepted in principle, disagree- 
ments as to the precise nature and limits of the program of the con- 
ference and the repeated disturbances growing out of boundary dis- 
putes have prevented the consummation of the plan, though the tend- 
ency appears to be steadily in favor of confederation. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

(Acknowledgments and references) 

CHAPTER I. GENERAL 

H. R. Mill, The. International Geography (New York, 1909), and the articles on the 
various countries in the Encyclopu'dia Britannica, 12th ed. (1911), present the primary 
geographic facts with respect to all parts of the world. E. A. Freeman, Ilislorical Geog- 
raphy of Europe, 2 vols., incl. atlas, 3d ed. (London, 1903) ; a classic on the history of 
political boundaries. W. Z. Ripley, The Races of Europe (New York, 1900) ; a standard 
reference on the anthropology of European peoples, illustrated with many photographs of 
ethnic types and a series of clear and valuable distributional maps. Sir H. J. Mackinder, 
Democratic Ideals and Reality (New York, 1919), is a striking philosophical essay by a 
distinguished English geographer; it puts into high relief two contrasting aspects of world 
conquest — routes and methods of warfare upon the land and u[)()n the sea — and thus 
supplies a broad geographic and political basis for understanding the World War and the 
probable tendencies of the future. II. J. Fleure, Hainan Geograpliy in Western Europe, 
2(1 ed. (London, 1919), and .Ikan Briinues, Human Geography, V^ngl. ed. (Chicago, 1920), 
will be found especially valuable in supplying a g(H)grni)hic framework for l*]ur()i)ean studies. 
Sir Thomas II. Holdich, Boundaries in Europe and the Near East (London, 1918), with the 
same author's Political Frontiers and Boundary Making (London, 1916), upholds the idea 
of the value of barriers as boundaries. A. P. Brigiiam, " Principles in the Determination 
of Boundaries," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 7, 1919, pp. 201-219, discusses the role of boundaries as 
zones of assimilation. L. W. Lyde, Some Frontiers of Tomorrow: An Aspiration for Europe 
(London, 1915), presents the argument for assimilative rather than defensive frontiers. 
Leon Dominian, The Frontiers of Language and Nationality in Europe (New York, 1917), 
and A. J. Toynbee, Nationality and the War (London, 1915), deal with ethnic and politi- 
cal problems; but they were written before the present boundaries were established. 
The Cambridge Modern History, 11 vols., incl. atlas (1902-1912), is a large standard work 
of importance to the student of history and political geograi)hy ; it contains especially 
useful bibliographies, but its articles vary greatly in value. Sir Edward Hertslet, Tlic 
Map of Europe by Treaty, 4 vols., with maps (London, 1875 and 1891), contains the basic 
treaties and agreements for the period 1814 to 1891. Carlton J. 11. Hayes, A Political 
and Social History of Modern Europe, 2 vols. (New York, 1917), is a readable work that 
supplies a good historical basis for the study of current political problems; the second 
volume covers the period between 1815 and 1914. C. D. Hazen, Europe since 1815 (New 
York, 1910), is also useful for this piiriod. J. H. Rose, The Development of Modern Europe, 
5th ed., 2 vols, in one (New York, 1916), deals with the period from 1870 to 1914 in con- 
siderable detail. Charles Seymour, Tlie Diplomatic Background of the War (New Haven, 
1916), has become a standard work in its field. See also F. M. Anderson and A. S. 
Hersiiey, Handbook for the Diplomatic History of Europe, Asia, and Africa, 1870-191/i 
(Washington, 1918), and the bibliographical notes therein contained. (For further refer- 
ence to this work see the introduc^tory note to the Ai)j)endix). Sir Harry Johnston, Com- 
mon Sense in Foreign Policy (New York, 19115) . is an able statement of many of the lead- 
ing international problems as they stood just before the opening of the World War. 

C. II. Haskins and R. II. Loau, Some Problems of the Peace Conference (Cambridge, 
1920), is the best available treatise on the historical bases of European territorial disputes 
that were affected by the peace treaties of 1919-1920. H. V. Temperley, editor, A History 
of the Peace Conference of Paris (London, 1920), to be published in 5 volumes, 3 of which 
have appeared, under the auspices of the Institute of International Affairs, contains much 
documentary material bearing on the peace conference, together with interpretive chap- 
ters. The British Foreign Office is publishing as Peace Handbooks the material prepared 

583 



584 The New World 

for the British delegation at the Peace Conference of Paris. The geographical commis- 
sion of the French Service Geographique de I'Ajmee publishes a valuable series of military 
handbooks on various parts of the world ; they are illustrated with maps, and describe in 
some detail the regions with which they deal. Karl Andree, Geographic des Welihandels, 
3 vols. (Frankfort, 1910-1913), is a very satisfactory general treatment of its subject. 
F. Lange, Landwirtschafllich Statistischer Alias (Berlin, 1917), contains a valuable series of 
production maps. Finch and Baker, Geography of Ihe World's Agriculture (Washington, 
1917), is a useful study of the sources of the world's supply of food and other agricultural 
products. E. Gruner and G. Bousquet, Alias General des Houilleres (Paris, 1909), consists 
of an atlas with accompanying text, and contains large-scale maps of the various European 
coal areas. World Alias of Commercial Geology, Pari I, Distribution of Mineral Production, 
by the United States Geological Survey (Washington, 1921), is one of the most useful 
government pubhcations ever printed ; it is a world survey (text and maps) of the chief 
commercial minerals and will be followed in time by a second atlas on mineral reserves. 
The International Institute of Agriculture, which has its central office at Rome, publishes 
a valuable annual that contains statistics respecting the production, consumption, and 
international exchange of the principal foodstuffs. Sir Boverton Redwood, A Treatise 
on Petroleum, 3 vols., 3d ed. (London, 1913), is both comprehensive and conveniently 
arranged for reference; it contains a number of maps and diagrams. W. M. Fullerton, 
Problems of Power (London, 1913), discusses pointedly some of the critical disputes that 
ultimately led to the World War. Albert Demangeon, Le Declin de VEurope (Paris, 
1920), pictures the changes in world trade that the war has caused; Engl. ed. (New York, 
1921) entitled America and the Race for World Dominion. G. G. Chisholm, Handbook of 
Commercial Geography (London, 1908), is still the best single reference in its field. M. 
Dubois, J. G. Kergomard, and I. Lafitte, Precis de Geographic Economique, 2d ed. (Paris, 
1903), and J. G. Bartholomew, Atlas of the World's Commerce (London, 1906), are impor- 
tant general references. Abraham Berglund, "The War and the World's Mercantile 
Marine," Amer. Econ. Rev., Vol. 10, 1920, pp. 227-258, contains an authoritative statement 
of the after-war shipping situation and of the probable commercial poUcy of the various 
nations. 

The publications of the Institut Colonial International include eleven series of mono- 
graphs (Brussels, 1894-1914) on subjects relating to colonies and colonial life. The fol- 
lowing books are especially recommended for the subjects indicated in their titles : P. M. 
Ogilvie, International Waterways (New York, 1920) ; G. Kaeckenbeeck, International 
Rivers, Pubhcations of the Grotius Society, No. 1 (London, 1918) ; Sarah Wambaugh, 
Monograph on Plebiscites (New York, 1920) ; A. G. Keller, Colonization (Boston, 1908). 

The following volumes appear annually, and will frequently be found useful: The 
Annual Register, a summary of pohtical happenings devoted chiefly, but not entirely, to 
the British Empire; The Statesman's Year-Book, especially valuable for its statistical 
material and its bibliographies; The New International Year Book, an annual supplement 
to the New International Encyclopedia. 

Among geographical periodicals the following publish many valuable articles in the 
field of pohtical geography, and are indispensable to the scholar : The Geographical Review, 
the American Geographical Society of New York ; The Geographi al Journal, the Royal 
Geographical Society of London ; La Geographic, la Societe de Geographic de Paris ; Annates 
de Geographic, pubUshed by Armand Cohn, Paris; Petermanns Mitteilungen, published 
by Justus Perthes, Gotha. The following periodicals contain a certain amount of 
material of exceptional value in the fields of economic and pohtical geography : The Ameri- 
can Economic Review; The American Historical Review; The American Journal of Inter- 
national Law; The American Political Science Review; Political Science Quarterly (issues 
an annual record of political events) ; The Economic Review review of the foreign press) ; 
L'Afrique Fran^aise; L'Asie Franqaise; The Near East; The New Europe (discontinued 
in 1920) ; The Round Table (devoted chiefly to the British Empire and its problems) ; 



Bibliography 585 

Current History Magazine (published by the New York Times). Valuable material will 
sometimes be found in the United Slates Commerce Reports, in the British Diplomatic and 
Consular Reports, and the annual Colonial Reports of the various British colonies. 

CHAPTER II. BRITISH EMPIRE 

The Oxford Survey of the British Empire, edited by A. J. Herbertson and O. J. R. 
HowARTH, 6 vols. (Oxford, 1914), is the best general survey of the empire and its parts. 
In addition there may be noted a series of volumes edited by Sir Charles Lucas under 
the title, A Historical Geography of the British Colonies (Oxford, 1887- ). Among shorter 
treatments of the same subject are the following : Lionel Curtis, The Commonwealth of 
Nations (London, 1918); its subtitle, "an inquiry into the nature of citizenship in the 
British Empire, and into the mutual relations of the several communities thereof," explains 
its purpose; admirable in treatment are its maps and diagrams (some in color), which 
attempt a critical display of the facts of distribution and area by comparative values ; Ed- 
ward Jenks, The Government of the British Empire (Boston, 1918) ; Sir Charles Lucas, 
The British Empire (London, 1915); A. F. Pollard, The British Empire: Its Past, Its 
Present, and Its Future (London, 1909) ; W. H. Woodward, The Expansion of the British 
Empire, 1500-1911 (Cambridge, 1911). On the government of England, see the standard 
work on that subject. The Government of England, 2 vols. (New York, 1912), by A. Law- 
rence Lowell. W. A. Dunning, The British Empire and the United States (New York, 
1914), surveys Anglo-American relations in the century from 1814 to 1914. A. B. Keith, 
Responsible Government in the Dominions, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1912), has a detailed and well- 
documented account of dominion government. Sir H. J. Mackinder, Britain and the Brit- 
ish Seas (Oxford, 1906), is a geographical treatment of the British Isles. A. J. Sargent, 
Seaways of the Empire (London, 1918), gives a clear picture of the geography of transport 
between the various parts of the great British trade realm ; it contains good semi-diagram- 
matic maps and recent statistics. Mark Jefferson, "The Distribution of British Cities, 
and the Empire," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 4, 1917, pp. 387-394. For an authoritative survey of 
the natural resources, trade, and food and raw material requirements of the British 
dominions, see the Final Report of the Dominions Royal Commission (London, 1918). 
H. Stanley Jevons' monograph on The British Coal Trade (London, 1915) is excellent; it 
contains a chapter on the world's coal resources. A. W. Kirkaldy, British Shipping: Its 
History, Organization, and Importance (London, 1914), may be mentioned. 

Official yearbooks are issued by most of the British colonies and dominions, and they 
form most valuable reference works. The Colonial Office List, issued yearly by the Crown, 
is informative ; it contains short descriptions and historical sketches of each of the 
British colonies, and a list of the Crown officers. H. J. Robinson, Colonial Chronology 
(London, 1892), will still be found useful. On the history of Canada see Sir John G, 
BouRiNOT, Canada under British Rule, 1760-1905, in Cambridge Historical Series (1909), 
or A. G. Bradley, Canada, in the Home University Library (London and New York, 1912). 
A. E. AspiNALL, The British West Indies (Boston, 1912), and Pocket Guide to the West Indies 
(Chicago, 1914). For South Africa, in addition to the official yearbook, reference should 
be made to Laite's Commercial Blue Book for South Africa (Cape Town), The South African 
Year-Book (London), and The Guide to South and East Africa, published annually by the 
Union-Castle Steamship Company, the latter covering the region from the Cape to Tan- 
ganyika Territory. Ernest Barker, Ireland in the Last Fifty Years (1866-1918), 2d ed, 
(Oxford, 1919), is a short but illuminating and rational survey of the Irish problem. Sir 
Horace Plunkett, Ireland in the New Century (London, 1904), is an indispensable ref- 
erence written by a scholar with practical experience in Irish affairs. W. O'C. Morris, 
Ireland: 1^9^-1905, in Cambridge Historical Series, 2d ed. (1909), is a review of the entire 
Irish question. 

On the Moslem confraternities see G. F. Andrews, " Islam and the Confraternities in 



58G The New World 

French North Africa," Geogr. Journ., Vol. 47, 1916, pp. 116-130, and the titles listed in the 
accompanying bibliography. For the present condition of agriculture in Egypt and an 
outline of the controversy between the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and the Egyptian adminis- 
tration respecting the control of the Nile waters, see the two principal papers in the con- 
troversy : (1) Sib William Willcocks, The Nile Projects (Cairo, 1919) ; (2) Sir Murdock 
MacDonald, Nile Control Works (Cairo, 1919). Sir William Willcocks and J. I. Craig, 
Egyptian Irrigation, 2 vols. (New York, 1913), is both technical and general. Lord 
Cromer, Modern Egypt, 2 vols. (London, 1908), is a masterly survey of British rule in 
Egypt. 

The Imperial Gazetteer of India, 3d ed., 26 vols. (Oxford, 1907-1909), includes a com- 
plete survey of India, as a whole and by parts, together with an excellent atlas. For a 
concise historical account consult Vincent A. Smith, The Oxford Student's History of India, 
3d ed. (Oxford, 1911). Sir Thomas H. Holdich, India (London, 1904), presents the coun- 
try from the geographical standpoint. B. H. Baden-Powell, The Land Systems of British 
India, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1892), and The Indian Village Community (London, 1896), are stan- 
dard works on the subject. The student should also consult John Matthai, Village Gov- 
ernment in British India (London, 1915). Lajpat Rai, England's Debt to India (New York, 
1917) presents an Indian view of the English occupation of India. A. Loveday, The His- 
tory and Economics of Indian Famines (London, 1914), is a convenient study ; it contains a 
history and tabulation of Indian famines from early times to the present, with a discussion 
of relief organization and protective measures. For accounts of India's problems on her 
northwestern frontier see Sir James Douie, The Panjab, North-west Frontier Province, and 
Kashmir (Cambridge, 1916), and Sir Thomas H. Holdich, The Gates of India (London, 
1910). J. C. Jack, The Economic Life of a Bengal District (Oxford, 1916), is an interesting 
study of the income and expenditure of persons living in Faridpur district, Bengal. C. W. 
Harrison, editor. An Illustrated Guide to the Federated Malay States (London, 1919?), has 
valuable material, including maps, not easily found elsewhere. W. E. Gibbs, "British 
Malaya: A Story of Empire," Journ. Manchester Geogr. Soc., Vol. 35, 1919, pp. 8-18, is a 
short historical, social, and economic survey of the Malay States. Sir J. S. Scott, Burma : 
A Handbook of Practical Information (London, 1911), is useful and excellently illustrated. 
Miss G. L. Bell has prepared a British official report entitled Review of the Civil Admin- 
istration of Mesopotamia (London, 1920), which presents the views of the chief Arab sheikhs 
of Mesopotamia toward British administration of the region. 

CHAPTER III. FRANCE 

G. Hanotaux, editor, Histoire de la Nation Frangaise, to be completed in 15 volumes, 
has been announced, and the Grst of two volumes by Jean Brunhes on the human geography 
of France has appeared (Paris, 1920) ; it will cover all phases of French history. Vidal 
Lablanche, La France (Paris, 1908), is the standard work on the regional geography of 
France ; it is exceptionally well illustrated. Onesime Reclus, Atlas de la Plus Grande 
France (Paris, 1913-1915), contains maps of the various French departments and colonies, 
together with descriptive and interpretive text. For a useful graphic presentation of the 
results of the census of 1901, see Album Graphique de la Statistique Generate de la France 
(Paris, 1907). Raymond PomcARf:, How France Is Governed (New York, 1914), and E. A. 
Vizetelly, Republican France, 1870-1912 (Boston, 1913), contain respectively a description 
of French political institutions and a history of France since the Franco-Prussian War. 
W^. M. Davis, A Handbook of Northern France (Cambridge, 1918), will be found especially 
valuable for its sketches and block diagrams of the region covered and for its compact 
physiographic descriptions. A. H. Brooks and Morris F. La Croix, The Iron and Asso- 
ciated Industries of Lorraine, the Sarre District, Luxemburg and Belgium, Bull. 703, U. S. 
Geol. Surv. (Washington, 1920), is a thoroughly scientific piece of work of great present 
interest in view of the close interweaving, in the Franco-German frontier zone, of political 



Bibliography 587 

and economic forces. The authoritative presentation of the French position with respect 
to Alsace-Lorraine, the Saar valley, Luxemburg, and the Rhineland is to be found in 
U Alsace-Lorraine, et la Froniiere du Nord-est (Paris, 1918) ; it constitutes Vol. 1 of the 
Travaux du Comite d'Etudes, a series of handbooks and monographs for the work of the 
Peace Conference of Paris, 1919. P. Vidal Lablache, " Evolution de la population en 
Alsace-Lorraine et dans les departements Umitrophes," Ann. de Geogr., Vol. 25, 1916, pp. 
97-115, 161-180, has maps showing density and movement of population. The following 
works contain presentations of the problem of Alsace-Lorraine from various points of view : 
Barry Cerf, Alsace-Lorraine since 1870 (New York, 1919) ; C. D. Hazen, Alsace-Lorraine 
under German Rule (New York, 1917) ; Coleman Phillipson, Alsace-Lorraine : Pasl, Pres- 
ent, and Future (London, 1918), advocates a plebiscite and contains an extensive bibUog- 
raphy; Lucien Gallois, "Alsace-Lorraine and Europe," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 6, 1918, pp. 89- 
115, is chiefly concerned with the economic resources in relation to the poUtical geography. 
For three valuable articles on the Saar basin, presenting respectively its historic, economic, 
and demographic characteristics, see Ann. de Geogr., Vol. 28, 1919, pp. 249-292. For an 
abstract of the third of these articles and a reproduction of the map showing density of 
population in the Saar basin on the scale of 1 : 1,430,000, see Geogr. Rev., Vol. 10, 1920, pp. 
42-43. Ruth Putnam, Luxemburg and Her Neighbors (New York, 1918), recounts the 
history of the grand duchy and outUnes its international position before the war. 

Useful yearbooks are issued by most of the French colonies. In addition the following 
bibliographies will be found of value in the further study of France's African colonies : 
Georqes Bruel, Ribliographie de V Afrique Equatoriale Franqaise (Paris, 1914) ; Edmond 
JoucLA, Bibliographie de V Afrique Occidentale Franqaise (Paris, 1912). E. Rouard de 
C\RD, Traites de Delimitation concernant V Afrique Franqaise (Paris, 1910), contains texts 
of treaties and illustrative maps for the period up to date of pubhcation. R. Godfernaux, 
Les Chemins de Fer Coloniaux Franqais (Paris, 1911), is quite detailed and complete (to 
date of pubhcation). The following works on Morocco should be consulted by the student 
desiring further information: J. Goulven, Le Maroc: Les Ressources de ses Regions; Sa 
Mise en Valeur (Paris, 1919) ; E. D. Morel, Morocco in Diplomacy (London, 1912) ; 
Victor Piquet, Le Maroc ; Geographic; Histoire; Mise en Valeur (Paris, 1920); Alfred 
DE Tarde, "The Work of France in Morocco," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 8, 1919, pp. 1-30. See also 
pp. 56-58 of the last-named volume for a note on the progress of French occupation. 
E. F. Gaxjtier, U Alger ie et la Metropole (Paris, 1920), offers a good brief outUne of Algerian 
hfe and problems. Henri Le Pointe, La Colonisation Franqaise au Pays des Somalis 
(Paris, 1917?), explains the value of Somaliland's position on the Red Sea and as a point* 
of exit for the Abyssinian hinterland. A convenient guide to the hterature of Syria is to 
be found in a large work by Paul Masson, Elements d'une Bibliographie Franqaise de la 
Syrie, 2 vols. (Marseilles, 1919). 

CHAPTER IV. BELGIUM 

La Belgique, published for the Liege Exposition of 1905 by the Belgian government, 
contains a survey of the country's resources and its industrial situation. H. Gehrig and 
H. Wautig, Belgians Volkswirtschaft (Berhn, 1918), covers the economic situation in the 
light of the German occupation. V. Bierkens, " Le Port d'Anvers : Son Avenir, son Im- 
portance Economique pour la Suisse," Bull. Soc. Neuchdteloise de Geogr., Vol. 28, 1919, 
pp. 5-208, describes the port and its relations to Swiss trade. For a brief history of Belgium 
consult R. C. K. Ensor, Belgium, in Home University Library (London and New York, 
1915); a short bibUography is given. Raoul Blanchard, La Flandre (Paris, 1906), is 
a regional geographical study of the Flemish plain in France, Belgium, and Holland. The 
books by E. D. Morel on the Congo have had great influence in the reorganization of 
that region. A. B. Keith, The Belgian Congo and the Berlin Act (London, 1919), is a 
historical study. 



588 The New World 

CHAPTER V. ITALY 

Among volumes on the political and economic situation before the outbreak of the 
World War may be mentioned: F. M. Underwood, United Italy (London, 1912) ; W. K. 
Wallace, Greater Italy (New York, 1917). E. M. Jamison, C. M. Ady, K. D. Vernon, 
C. S. Terry, Italy, Mediaeval and Modern (Oxford, 1917), is a convenient presentation of 
the essential facts of Itahan history, Olinto Marinelli, "The Regions of Mixed Popu- 
lations in Northern Italy," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 7, 1919, pp. 129-148, deals with the mixed 
language zones on Italy's frontier, in former Austria, Switzerland, and France. It repre- 
sents the Italian scientific viewpoint and is conservative in form. Cesare Battisti, // 
Trentino, 2d ed. (Novara, 1917), contains 19 maps, and outlines the Italian claims in the 
Tyrol. Attilio Tamaro, La Venetie Julienne et la Dalmatie : Ilisloire de la nation italienne 
sur ses frontieres orientates, 3 vols. (Rome, 1918), is the most comprehensive work on the 
subject, with abundant references to sources, and, although Italian in point of view, it is a 
basic reference. (See also references under Jugo-Slavia on the subject of Italy's claims in 
Istria and Dalmatia.) Attilio Brunialti, Trento e Trieste dal Brennero alle Rive delV 
Adriatico (Turin, 1916), is profusely illustrated, has many maps, and covers aU the 
Italian claims from the Trentino to Dalmatia. Guido Assereto, U Italia e le sue Colonie 
(Novara, 1913), contains many maps and diagrams illustrating the economic and political 
conditions of both Italy and her colonies. G. Bevione, UAsie Minore e V Italia (Turin, 
1914), sets forth the Italian view of the Turkish situation and the claims of Italy, espe- 
cially in the AdaUa region. The Annnario Statistico Ilaliano publishes each year a series 
of demographic maps and charts. 

CHAPTER VI. SPAIN 

C. E. Chapman, A History of Spain (New York, 1918), is a brief history of Spain based 
largely upon the comprehensive work of the Spanish historian, Altamira. Eduardo 
Reyes Prosper, Las Estepas de Espana y su Vegetacion (Madrid, 1915), describes the 
physical character of the drier portions of Spain. J. Dantin Cereceda, Resumen fisio- 
grafica de la peninsula iberica (Madrid, 1912), supplies the best available general view of the 
physiographic conditions in the natural regions of the Spanish peninsula. Don Alfonso 
Merry del Val, "The Spanish Zones in Morocco," Geogr. Journ., Vol. 55, 1920, pp. 319- 
349, 409-422, discusses Spanish interests in Morocco at the present time. Julius Klein, 
The Mesta (Cambridge, 1920), is a thorough study of the institution of that name, which 
'was developed by the grazing interests and dominated the economic life of portions of 
Spain for several centuries. For general references on subjects indicated in the respect- 
ive titles, see : I. M. Colmeiro, La Historia de la Economia Politica en Espana (Madrid, 
1863) ; Martin Hume, Spain, U79-1788 (Cambridge, 1913) ; R. B. Merriman, The Rise 
of the Spanish Empire in the Old World and in the New, 4 vols., of which 2 are published 
(New York, 1918). 

CHAPTER VII. PORTUGAL 

George Young, Portugal Old and Young: An Historical Study (Oxford, 1917), deals 
with the history and the present problems of Portugal. W. H. Koebel, Portugal: Its 
Land and People (London, 1909), and A. F. G. Bell, Portugal of the Portuguese (New 
York, 1915), are general references. Angel Marvaud, Le Portugal et ses colonies (Paris, 
1912), is a political and economic study. Luis Schwalbach, Emigragao e colonizagao 
(Lisbon, 1914), deals with the problems of colonization from the Portuguese standpoint. 

CHAPTER VIII. SCANDINAVIA AND HOLLAND 

For a summary presentation of the history of the Scandinavian countries see R. N. Bain, 
Scandinavia: A Political History of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, 1515-1900 (Cambridge, 



Bibliography 589 

1905). Paul Drachmann, The Industrial Development and Commercial Policies of the 
Three Scandinavian Countries (Oxford, 1915), reviews the interesting economic history of 
these lands. Among books on Denmark the following should be consulted : H. Rider 
Haggard, Rural Denmark and Its Lessons (New York, 1913) ; W. J. Harvey and Chris- 
tian Reppien, Denmark and the Danes: A Survey of Danish Life, Institutions and Culture 
(London, 1915). Norway (Kristiania, 1900), a work prepared for the Paris Exposition, 
contains an interesting survey of the country. Knut Gjerset, History of the Norwegian 
People, 2 vols. (New York, 1915), is concerned chiefly with history prior to the 19th cen- 
tury. J. GuiNCHARD, editor, Sweden: Historical and Statistical Handbook, 2d ed., 2 vols. 
(Stockholm, 1914), is issued under the direction of the government; it contains excellent 
articles on the present Ufe of Sweden and is well illustrated with photographs and maps. 
Sten de Geer, Befolkingens Fordelning i Sverige (Stockholm, 1919), is accompanied by a 
large map (1 : 500,000) showing by a dot and shaded circle method the exact distribution of 
population, as well as the distribution of forests, industrial enterprises, etc., — a model 
treatment. Helmer Key, La Vie Economique de la Suede (Paris, 1913), is a competent 
analysis of Sweden's economic life. The following references treat of Spitsbergen : 
R. N. RuDMOSE Brown, Spitsbergen (London, 1920); R. N. Rudmose Brown, "Spits- 
bergen, Terra Nullius," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 7, 1919, pp. 311-321; Charles Rarot, "The 
Norwegians in Spitsbergen," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 8, 1919, pp. 209-226. R. Schuiling, Neder- 
land: Handboek der Aardrijkskunde, 5th ed. (ZwoUe, 1915), is the standard geographical 
work on Holland ; it is amply supplied with statistical tables and extremely valuable maps 
and plans, many of them in color. K. Zeeman, Moderne Geographic van Nederland, 3d ed. 
(Amsterdam, 1917), relates the physiography to the economic and industrial geography. 
A. A. Beerman, Nederland als Polderland, 2d ed. (Zutphen, 1915), is an excellent detailed 
treatise on Holland's reclaimed areas. Yearbook of the Netherlands East Indies, English ed. 
(Batavia, 1920), is a well illustrated survey of the region. The following works will also 
be found useful, the first-named being the standard reference on the subject : Clive Day, 
The Policy and Administration of the Dutch in Java (New York, 1904) ; A. Cabaton, Java 
and the Dutch East Indies (New York, 1911). 



CHAPTER IX. SWITZERLAND 

Dictionnaire Geographique de la Suisse, 6 vols, and atlas (Neuchatel, 1902-1910). 
published under the auspices of La Societe Neuchateloise de Geographic, is the standard 
treatment of the subject. Atlas Graphique et Statistique de la Suisse (Berne, 1914), is 
published by the Bureau of Statistics of the Swiss Department of the Interior, and contains 
a series of beautifully printed and authoritative maps. R. C. Brooks, Government and 
Politics of Switzerland (Yonkers, 1918), is a well-ordered treatment of its subject. Henri 
Hauser, "La Position Geographique de la Suisse: Etude de Geographic Politique," Ann. 
de Geogr., 15 Nov. 1911, pp. 413-429, deals with Switzerland's relations to Europe's navi- 
gable waterways. See also E. J. Clapp, The Navigable Rhine (New York, 1911). Hektor 
Ammann, Die Italiener in der Schweiz (Basle, 1917), studies the problems arising from the 
increase of Italian population in Switzerland. 

CHAPTER X. GERMANY 

Joseph Partsch, Central Europe (New York, 1903), is a scientific geographical survey 
of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, the Netherlands, Serbia, Rumania, and Bulgaria. 
Friedrich Naumann, Central Europe, trans, by C. M. Meredith (London, 1916), deals 
with the political and economic phases of the German imperial project from the German 
point of view and was especially influential during the war period. J. A. R. Marriott and 
C. G. Robertson, The Evolution of Prussia : The Making of an Empire (Oxford, 1917), traces 



590 The New World 

the growth of the German Empire. Jean Brunhes and Camille Vallaux, "German 
Colonization in Eastern Europe," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 6, pp. 465-480, contains valuable 
historical and statistical information ; it gives the number of Ukrainians in the various 
governments of southern Russia. For Germany after the revolution of 1918 and 
the treaty of Versailles, see George Young, The New Germany (London, 1920). L. Gal- 
LOis, "La Paix de Versailles : Les nouvelles frontieres de I'Allemagne," Ann. de Geogr., 
Vol. 28, 1919, pp. 241-248. Das Deutsche Kolonialreich, 2 vols. (Leipzig and Vienna, 
1909), by Hans Meyers and others, is the standard reference on former German colonies; 
it is elaborately illustrated with photographs and colored maps. On the same subject see 
Evans Lewin, The Germans and Africa (New York, 1915), and William Eveleigh, South- 
west Africa (London, 1915); the latter discusses the suitability of the colony for white 
settlement. On Germany's former colonies in the Pacific see William Churchill, 'Ger- 
many's Lost Pacific Empire," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 10, 1920, pp. 84-90. Handbuch des Wirt- 
scliaftskunde Deutschlands, 4 vols. (Leipzig, 1901-1904), pubhshed by the Deutschen Ver- 
bandes fiir das Kaufmannische Unterrichtswesen, is valuable, though based on the census 
of 1895. Joseph Partsch, Schlesien, Eine Landeskunde fiir das deulsche Volk, 2 vols. 
(Breslau, 1896), is a detailed regional geographical study of German Silesia. It is accom- 
panied by colored maps and sketches, and though now somewhat out of date, it is still 
one of the best regional studies in the field of modern geography. 

CHAPTER XL AUSTRIA 

Die Osterreichisch-Ungarnische Monarchic in Wort und Rild, 24 vols. (Vienna, 1886- 
1902), contains a detailed survey of the former empire by provinces. The following 
contain studies of the national and other problems of Austria before the World War : 
ViRGiNio Gayda, Modern Austria : Her Racial and Social Problems (London, 1915) ; H. W^ 
Steed, The Hapsburg Monarchy, 3d ed. (London, 1914) ; the various books of R. W. 
Seton- Watson ; B. C. Wallis, "The Peoples of Austria," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 6, 1918, pp. 
52-65. E. DE Martonne, "Le traite de Saint-Germain et le demembrement de 
I'Autriche," Ann. de Geogr., Vol. 29, 1920, pp. 1-11, pictures the present situation. 

CHAPTER XII. HUNGARY 

L. Eisenmann, "La Nouvelle Hongrie," Ann. de Geogr., Sept. 1920, pp. 321-33,3, 
discusses Hungary within its new boundaries ; valuable especially for its statistical material 
and its outline of geographical conditions. For discussions of former Hungary's national 
problems see: A. Hevesy, Nationalities in Hungary (London, 1919); B. C. Wallis, "The 
Peoples of Hungary," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 4, 1917, pp. 465-481; and by the same author, 
"Central Hungary: Magyars and Germans," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 6, 1918, pp. 421-435. 
Magyarorszdg Gazdasdgi Terkepekben (The Economics of Hungary in Maps), edited by 
GusTAVus DE Emich, prepared by Aladar de E. Ill^s and Albert Halasz (Budapest, 
1920), contains 74 maps, 6 diagrams, and in the preface a fist of references to sources ; the 
several maps give a complete picture of the economic elements of Hungary before the 
World War ; almost every map is accompanied by a transparency of present and former 
boundaries, thus making it possible to see at a glance just what Hungary has lost as a 
consequence of the war. 

CHAPTER XIII. CZECHO-SLOVAKIA 

E. Benes, Bohemia's Case for Independence (London, 1916), and Vladimir Nosek, 
Independent Bohemia : An Account of the Czecho-Slovak Struggle for Liberty (London, 1918), 
outline the arguments for the formation of the Czecho-Slovak state. Manuel statistique 
de la Republique tcheco-slovaque (Prague, 1920) gives the latest available statistics on the 
area, population, size of farm holdings, and resources of the various main pohtical divisions 



Bibliography 591 

of the state. B. C. Wallis, "The Slavs of Northern Hungary," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 6, 1918, 
pp. 268-281, presents the demographic facts and the nationed and economic problems 
connected with the Slovaks and Ruthenians of Hmigary. E. de Martonne, "L'l^tat 
Tchecoslovaque," Ann. de Geogr., May, 1920, pp. 161-181, discusses the territorial limits 
and economic situation of the state as determined at Paris in 1919-1920. 

CHAPTER XIV. JUGO-SLAVIAi 

JovAN CviJic, La Peninsule Balkanique (Paris, 1918), is a thorough geographical 
treatment of the Balkan region and especially of the territory inhabited by the Jugo-Slavs. 
M. I. Newbigin, Geographical Aspects of Balkan Problems in their Relation to the Great 
European War (London, 1915), deals in an exceptionally clear manner with the poUtical 
geography of the region. M. I. Newbigin, "The Geographical Factor in Balkan Ques- 
tions," Scientia, Jan. 1921, pp. 41-50, is a short but competent treatment of the subject. 
The Commission de Geographic of the Service Geographique de I'Armee has pubhshed 
a number of geographical booklets on various parts of the Balkans, illustrated with maps 
and diagrams. R. W. Seton-Watson, The Rise of Nationality in the Balkans (London, 
1917), is a survey of the nationality problem in the Balkans. J. A. R. Marriott, The 
Eastern Question: An Historical Study in European Diplomacy (Oxford, 1917), presents 
briefly the recent history of the Balkans. J. G. Schurman, The Balkan Wars, 3d ed. 
(Princeton, 1916), is a short but useful presentation of the subject. R. W. Seton-Watson, 
The Southern Slav Question and the Hapsburg Monarchy (London, 1911), and A. H. E. Tay- 
lor, The Future of the Southern Slavs (New York, 1917), are excellent treatises. B. C. 
Wallis, " The Slavs of Southern Hungary," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 6, 1918, pp. 341-353, is useful 
for its maps and statistical analyses. Clive Day, "The Pre-war Commerce and the 
Commercial Approaches of the Balkan Peninsula," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 9, 1920, pp. 277-298, 
describes the backward economic conditions of the Balkans and the pre-war commercial 
pathways. 

H. W. V. Temperley, History of Serbia (London, 1917), presents essential facts. 
F. S. Stevenson, A History of Montenegro (London, no date), is convenient. For a 
presentation of recent events by a partisan of the late ex-King Nicholas see A. Devine, 
Montenegro in History, Politics, and War (London, 1918). Report of the International 
Commission to Inquire into the Causes and Conduct of the Balkan Wars (Washington, 
1914), is a valuable impartial account on the basis of field investigations. Attilio Tamaro, 
La Venetie Julienne et la Dalmatie : Histoire de la nation italienne sur ses fronticres orientates, 
3 vols. (Rome, 1918-1919) ; see comment on this work in the section of this bibliography 
deaUng with Italy. Giotto Dainelli, La Dalmazia : Cenni Geografici e Statistici (Novara, 
1918), consists of an atlas with accompanying text, and presents the Italian claim to Dal- 
matia, with full cartographic treatment of the demographic facts. A. G. Ogilvie, "A 
Contribution to the Geography of Macedonia," Geogr. Journ., Vol. 55, 1920, pp. 1-34, 
explains the physiographic character of the region and the chief aspects of the human 
geography as well. The following books deal with the Macedonian problem : H. N. Brails- 
ford, Macedonia : Its Races and Their Future (London, 1906) ; D. M. Brancoff, La 
Macedoine et sa Population Chretienne (Paris, 1905), a statistical study from the Bulgarian 
point of view; T. R. Georgevitch, Macedonia (New York, 1918), from the Serbian stand- 
point. Wage and Thompson, The Nomads of the Balkans (London, 1914), is concerned 
with the Vlach settlements in the Balkans. 

R. J. Kerner, Slavic Europe: A Selected Bibliography in the Western European 
Languages (Cambridge, 1918), is a scientific bibliography, brought down to the beginning 
of the World War ; the works cited deal with the Russians, Poles, Czecho-Slovaks, Jugo- 
Slavs, and Bulgarians. 

1 Including general references to the Balkans. 



592 The New World 



CHAPTER XV. RUMANIA 

For a discussion of the Rumanian national problem see R. W. Seton-Watson, Rou- 
mania and the Great War (London, 1915), and EuGi:NE Pittaiu), La Roumanie (Paris, 1917). 
N. P. CoMMKNE, La Dobrogea: Essai Ilistorique, Economique, Etlmographique el Politique 
(Paris, 1918), is a treatment of the Dobrudja problem from the Rumanian point of view. 
E. DE Martonne, La Valachie : Essai de Monographie Geograpliique (Paris, 1902), is 'a 
thorough geographical treatment with excellent maps and illustrations. See also the same 
author's "Essai de carte etlmographique des pays roumains," Ann. de Geogr., Vol. 29, 1920, 
pp. 81-98, which combines upon one colored map the density of population and the ethnic 
composition; and "La Nouvelle Roumanie," Ann. de Geogr., Vol. 30, 1921, pp. 1-31, con- 
taining a description of the natural regions and the economic life. 

CHAPTER XVL BULGARIA 

Bulgaria of Today (London, 1907), by the Bulgarian Ministry of Commerce and 
Agriculture, describes the country, and is still useful in many particulars, though it was 
compiled before the Balkan wars. For presentations of the claims of Bulgaria see the 
following: Balkanicus, The Aspirations of Bulgaria (London, 1915); A. Ishirkoff, 
Bulgarien: Land und Leute (Leipzig, 1917). For presentations of Jugo-Slav claims, see 
other references above. J. Ivanoff, Les Bulgares devant le Congres de la Paix, 2d ed. 
(Berne, 1919), outlines the Bulgarian position in relation to the peace settlement. 

CHAPTER XVII. ALBANIA 

Miss Edith Durham, High Albania (London, 1909), and The Struggle for Scutari 
(London, 1914), give vivid and intimate pictures of Albanian life and problems. G. Louis- 
Jaray, L'Albanie Inconnue (Paris, 1913), is a more scientific survey of the country. Among 
other works may be mentioned Wadham Peacock, Albania : The Foundling Slate of Europe 
(London, 1914); C. A. Chekrezi, Albania, Past and Present (New York, 1919); C. A. 
Dako, Albania: The Master Key to the Near East (Boston, 1919). The last two are by 
Albanians. 

CHAPTER XVIII. GREECE 

H. Lefeuvre-Meaulle, La Grece economique et financiere (Paris, 1916), outlines 
Greece's position in the eastern Mediterranean. J. P. Mahaffy, Rambles and Studies in 
Greece, 7th ed. (New York, 1913), is a well-tried volume by a noted classical scholar. See 
also W. Miller, Greek Life in Town and Country (London, 1905). A. G. Keller, Homeric 
Society (New York, 1906), presents not only a picture of early Greek fife but also the begin- 
nings of colonization. Otto Maull, " Kultur- und PoHtischgeographische Entwicklung 
und Aufgaben des Heutigen Griechenlands," Mitteilungen der Geographischen Gesellschaft 
in Miinchen, Vol. 2, Dec. 1915, pp. 91-171, is a comprehensive paper on the political and 
economic geography of the southwestern Balkans and is illustrated by a map representing 
the commercial routes, the chief belts of production and trade, the main climatic elements, 
the ecclesiastical boundaries, etc. 

CHAPTER XIX. POLAND 

Eugeniusz Romer, Atlas Geograpliique et Slatislique de la Pologne (Warsaw, 1916), 
is indispensable for a thorough understanding of Polish problems. It contains 32 colored 
plates with explanatory text in French, Polish, and German. The same author has a 



Bibliography 593 

brilliant article entitled "Poland: The Land and the State" in the Geogr. Rev., Vol. 4, 
1917, pp. 6-25. Vol. 1 of the Polish Encyclopsedia (Warsaw, 1912) contains a treatment 
of the physical geography of the Pohsh region and the physical characteristics of its in- 
habitants. E. WuNDERLiCH, editor, Handbuch von Polen (Kongress-Pulen) : Beiirdge zu 
einer Allgemeinen Landeskunde, 2d ed. (BerUn, 1918), is a broad geographical siu^vey 
prepared under the direction of the German governor-general of Warsaw after the 
occupation of Russian Poland during the World War. Handbuch des Oberschlesischen In- 
dusiriebezirks. Vol. 2 of Festschrifl zuni XII. Allgemeinen Deutschen Bergmannslage in 
Breslau, 1913, is accompanied by a number of large-scale maps of the Silesian industrial 
region. For the history of Poland see H. E. Lewinski-Korwin, The Political History of 
Poland (New York, 1917). R. H. Lord, The Second Partition of Poland, a Study in Diplo- 
matic History (Cambridge, 1915), is a thorough piece of historical research and is funda- 
mental to a study of Polish national character and problems in the period of decUne that 
ended with the fall of the Republic. E. Romer, " Statistics of the Languages of the Prov- 
inces being under the Polish Civil Administration of the Eastern Lands (December 1919)," 
(Warsaw, 1920), gives the statistical results and an analysis of them, of a census taken in 
the governments of Minsk, Vilna, and Brest-Litovsk ; the data relate to the disputed zone 
about Minsk, where the Soviet government made concessions to the Poles in the final 
treaty of peace signed early in 1921, and the disputed zone about Vilna, where Polish 
troops are in occupation pending the final settlement ; the title given above is taken ver- 
batim from the title page of the publication, which is printed in Polish and Enghsh in 
parallel columns. 

CHAPTERS XX, XXI. BALTIC STATES 

L. M. Larson, "Territorial Problems of the Baltic Basin," Univ. of Illinois Bull., 
Vol. 16, No. 18, 1918, deals with Slesvig, Finland, the Baltic Provinces, and Danzig. In 
Meereskunde, No. 152, 1919, Richard Pohle sketches the growth of Riga; his paper is 
illustrated by several interesting maps. M. Martna, UEsthonie; Les Esthoniens et la 
Question Esthonienne (Paris, 1920), covers the problems of Esthonia from the national 
point of view. A concise article on "The Peoples of the Baltic Provinces and Lithuania" 
is to be found in the Round Table, March 1918, pp. 293-307. Otto Kessler, Die Balten- 
Idnder und Lilauen (Berlin, 1916), contains statistical material of value. See also K. A. 
Jusaitis, The History of the Lithuanian Nation and its Present National Aspirations (Phila- 
delphia, 1918). 

CHAPTER XXII. FINLAND 

Atlas de Finlande, 1910, atlas and 2 vols, of text (Helsingfors, 1911), together with the 
earlier Atlas de Slatistique Sociale sur les Communes Rurales de Finlande en 1901 (Helsingfors, 
1908), were published by the Finnish Geographical Society, and constitute the best exist- 
ing siu*vey, along the lines of scientific geography, of the social and pohtical conditions 
of the country. Finnland im Anfang des XX. Jahrhunderfs (Helsingfors, 1920), pubHshed 
by the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs, despite its title has been brought down to 
1919 ; it contains many maps. For descriptions of the country and the people consult : 
Arthur Reade, Finland and the Finns (London, 1914); Werner Soderjhelm, editor, 
Finlande et Finlandais (Paris, 1913) ; Ernest Young, Finland: The Land of a Thousand 
Lakes (London, 1912); Erland Nordenskiold, "Finland: The Land and the People," 
Geogr. Rev., Vol. 7, 1919, pp. 361-379. 

CHAPTER XXIII. RUSSIA 

Gregor Alexinsky, Modern Russia (London, 1913), is a general treatment of the 
historical and economic development of Russia, the constitutional situation before the 



594 The New World 

World War, Russia's literature, and the problems of nationality and religion. The follow- 
ing works on the history of Russia may be recommended : R. Beazley, N. Forbes, and 
G. A. BiRKETT, Russia from the Varangians to the Bolsheviks (Oxford, 1918) ; F. H. Skbine, 
The Expansion of Russia, 1815-1900 (Cambridge, 1904). The Russian Almanac (annual, 
London) continues the Russian Year Book and contains much statistical and other informa- 
tion. M. J. Olgin, The Soul of the Russian Revolution (New York, 1917), is an intimate 
and detailed view, chiefly social and pohtical, but containing also valuable sections on land 
tenure and local village or community government. J. M. Crawford, editor. The Indus- 
tries of Russia, 5 vols. (St. Petersburg, 1893), prepared by the Russian government for the 
World's Fair at Chicago, and W. de Kovalevsky, editor. La Russie a la Fin du 19^ Steele 
(Paris, 1900), published for the Paris Exposition, contain many useful maps and much 
statistical material, and will be found especially useful in comparative studies. For a 
statistical treatment of the Russian population by nationalities, see Rudoij- Claus, " Die 
Zusammensetzung der Bevolkerung Russlands nach Nationahtaten," Zeitschrift des Konig- 
lich Preussischen Statistischen Landesamts, Vol. 55, 1915, pp. 1-12. The same number of 
this publication, pp. 13-22, contains a valuable article v ith statistical material on agri- 
cultural and industrial production, "Die russische landwirtschaftliche und industrieUe 
Produktion," by C. Ballod. T. H. Engelbrecht, Landwirtschaftlicher Atlas des Rus- 
sischen Reiches in Europa und Asien (Berhn, 1916), contains an excellent series of maps 
displaying the economic resources of the Russian Empire. Walther Tuckermann, Ver- 
kehrsgeographie der Eisenbahnen des Europdischen Russland (Essen, 1916), includes a history 
of Russian railroads and a survey of their present economic and strategic importance. 
The two following works treat of the commercial importance of Russia : W. H. Beable, 
Commercial Russia (New York, 1919) ; Arthur Raffalovich, editor, Russia : Its Trade 
and Commerce (London, 1918). Among other important works on Russia in the last few 
years see: E. Antonelli, Bolshevist Russia (London, 1920); T. G. Masabyk, The Spirit 
of Russia, 2 vols. (London, 1919) ; E. A. Ross, Russia in Upheaval (New York, 1919) ; 
Charles Sarolea, Great Russia : Her Achievement and Promise (New York, 1916) ; H. W. 
Williams, Russia of the Russians (New York, 1915). Stephen Rudnitsky, Ukraine: 
The Land and Its People (New York, 1918), is published by the Ukrainian AlUance of 
America; it had previously appeared in German under the title Ukraina — Land und 
Volk: Eine Gemeinfassliche Landeskunde (Vienna, 1916). Foremost among works on 
Siberia is the Atlas of Asiatic Russia, published in Russian in 191 1 by the Colonization 
Bureau ; it contains an excellent series of maps and is accompanied by descriptive text in 
three volumes. The following additional volumes may be noted : M. A. Czaplicka, 
Aboriginal Siberia (Oxford, 1914) ; Fridtjof Nansen, Through Siberia (New York, 1914); 
M. P. Price, Siberia (London, 1912). 

CHAPTER XXIV. CONSTANTINOPLE 

Paul Masson, "Constantinople et les detroits," Ann. de Geogr., Vol. 28, 1919, pp. 121- 
142, is a thorough statistical study of the commerce of the Straits. C. Phillipson and 
N. Buxton, The Question of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles (London, 1917), contains a 
well-rounded and scholarly treatment of the problem. The handbook on the Dardanelles 
and the Bosporus, published by the French Commission de Geographie of the Service 
Geographique de I'Armee (Paris, 1915), should also be consulted; it contains a relief map 
and a plan of the city of Constantinople. For the relation of the Hellespont to the Greek 
world, and especially its place in Greek commerce and politics, see G. Neilson, "The 
Hellespont in Retrospect," Proc. Royal Philos. Soc. (Glasgow), Vol. 47, 1915-16, pp. 1-24. 
H. C. DwiGHT, Constantinople, Old and New (London, 1915), treats of the life of the city 
and to some degree of its recent history. 



Bibliography 595 

CHAPTER XXV. PALESTINE 

G. A. Smith, The Historical Geography of the Holy Land, 13th ed. (London, 1907), is a 
classic work, and is now admirably supplemented by the same author's Atlas of the His- 
torical Geography of the Holy Land (London, 1915). Ellsworth Huntington, Palestine 
and Us Transformation (Boston, 1911), is a suggestive treatment of the influence of cUmatic 
factors in the Holy Land. See also "The Future of Palestine" by the same author, Geogr. 
Rev., Vol. 7, 1919, pp. 24-35. Isidore Singer, editor, The Jewish Encyclopedia, 12 vols. 
(New York, 1901-1906), should be consulted upon problems connected with the Jews which 
had taken shape before its pubhcation. Among recent works on the Jewish people may be 
cited : Arthur Ruppin, The Jews of Today (New York, 1913) ; Norman Bentwick, 
Palestine of the Jews, Past, Present, and Future (London, 1919). Albert T. Clay, "Polit- 
ical Zionism," Atlantic Monthly, Feb. 1921, discusses the pohtical phases of the Zionist 
movement and of the Palestinian mandate. Mention may be made of Palestine, a small 
weekly pubhshed at London which chronicles events in Palestine from the Zionist stand- 
point. 

CHAPTER XXVI. ANATOLIA 

D. G. Hogarth, The Nearer East (New York, 1902), covers the region at the eastern 
end of the Mediterranean and beyond to Persia and Arabia, and contains many maps and 
diaj^rams. Vital Cuinet, La Turquie d'Asie, 4 vols. (Paris, 1900), has been the standard 
woi k on Asiatic Turkey, though it is now unreliable because of the great shifting of popula- 
tiori due to war and forced migration; it discusses each vilayet systematically. Among 
othjr geographical works which may be mentioned are: Ewald Banse, Die Tiirkei : Eine 
Moderne Geographic (Brunswick, 1915) ; Alfred Philippson, Das Turkische Reich (Weimar, 
1916). William Miller, The Ottoman Empire, i801-i9l3 (Cambridge, 1913), is a useful 
volume with extensive bibliographies, but it does not carry the story through the Balkan 
wars. Other historical works of note are: W. E. D. Allen, The Turks in Europe: A 
Sketch Study (London, 1919); Lord Eversley, The Turkish Empire: Hs Growth and 
Decay (London, 1917). M. A. Czaplicka, The Turks of Central Asia in History and at the 
Present Day (London, 1918), is "an ethnological inquiry into the Pan-Turanian problem." 
The Handbook on the Bagdad Railway pubhshed by the Commission de Geographie of the 
Service Geographique de I'Armee (Paris, 1916), describes in detail the route traversed by 
this important line. 

CHAPTERS XXVII, XXVIII. TRANSCAUCASIA 

Noel and Harold Bltxton, Travel and Politics in Armenia (London, 1914), is note- 
worthy. H. F. B. Lynch, Armenia: Travels and Studies, 2 vols. (London, 1901); Vol. 1 
deals with the Russian provinces and Vol. 2 with the Turkish provinces. D. Ghambash- 
idze. Mineral Resources of Georgia and Caucasia (London, 1919), though brief, is a useful 
treatise. A valuable reference is Conditions in the Near East, the report of the American 
MiUtary Mission to Armenia, Major General J. G. Harbord, 1919, pubhshed as Senate 
Document No. 266. Richard Cottheil, "Armenia and the Armenians. A List of Ref- 
erences in the New York Pubhc Library," Bell. N. Y. Publ. Lib., Vol. 23, 1919, pp. 123- 
143, 251-277, 303-336. W. L. Williams, Armenia: Past and Present (London, 1916), is 
almost whoUy concerned with Turkish Armenia. J. D. Henry, Baku: An Eventful History 
(London, 1906), gives an account of the oil region, 

CHAPTER XXIX. PERSIA 

P. M. Sykes, a History of Persia, 2 a^oIs. (London, 1915), carries the story of Persian 
history down to 1905. W. Morgan Shuster, The Strangling of Persia (New York, 1912), 



596 The New World 

is an account of the author's experiences as Treasurer-General of Persia. J. DeMorgan, 
Mission Scienlifique en Perse, 5 vols. (Paris, 1894-1905), is the basis of a large pEirt of our 
geographical knowledge of Persia. A. V. W. Jackson, Persia Past and Present : A Book 
of Travel and Research (New York, 1906), contains useful material. G. N. Cubzon (Lord 
Curzon), Persia and the Persian Question (London, 1892), is a general treatise with the 
emphasis chiefly upon poUtical questions ; there is an abundance of geographical data ; the 
point of view is frankly British and imperial. 

CHAPTER XXX. INNER ASIA 

H. H. HowoRTH, History of the Mongols, 4 vols. (London, 1876-1888), is a standard work 
on the Mongol invasions. It covers the period from the 9 th century. Ellsworth 
Huntington, The Pulse of Asia (Boston, 1907), is a study in geographic environment and 
the influence of climate on history ; the claim is made that the drier phases of cUmatic cycles 
account for the Mongol invasions of Europe. Arved Schultz, Die Naturlichen Land- 
schaften von Russisch-Turkestan (Hamburg, 1920), is a geographical work on Russian Inner 
Asia. Other works on the same region are : W. E. Curtis, Turkestan : The Heart of Asia 
(New York, 1911) ; A. Woeikof, Le Turkestan Russe (Paris, 1914). E. N. Fell, Russian 
and Nomad: Tales of the Kirghiz Steppes (New York, 1916), gives an interesting account 
of travel and hfe in central Siberia about Lake Balkash. Standard references on geograph- 
ical and archaeological subjects are the recent articles or books, published variously, by 
SvEN Hedin, Sir Aurel Stein, Holdich, and Younghusband. 

CHAPTER XXXI. THE FAR EAST 

A. Little, The Far East (Oxford, 1905), is a geographic treatment by a scholar long 
resident in China. Sir Robert K. Douglas, Europe and the Far East, 1506-1912 (New 
York, 1913), deals with the interaction of Orient and Occident. S. K. Hornbeck, Con- 
temporary Politics in the Far East (New York, 1916), covers events leading up to the presen- 
tation of the Twenty-One Demands by Japan. See also K. S. Latourette, The Develop- 
ment of China (New York, 1918). Hosea Ballou Morse, The International Relations of 
the Chinese Empire, 3 vols. (London, 1910-1918), surveys comprehensively the period from 
1834 to 1911. See also the same author's The Trade and Administration of China (London, 
1913). Samuel Couling, editor, The Encyclopedia Sinica (London, 1918), is a general 
reference. E. J. Dingle, editor, The Neiv Atlas and Commercial Gazetteer of China (Shang- 
hai, 1918) ; the text contains a comprehensive treatment of the economic resources, means 
of transportation, principal cities, etc., of the various provinces of China. G. Maspero, 
La Chine (Paris, 1918), has a useful account of the geography, history, and political and 
social structure of China, together with the history of Chino-Japanese relations and the 
various treaties that affect the present political situation. The China Year Book, 5th ed. 
(London, 1920) and The Japan Year Book (pubhshed annually at Tokio) are useful as gen- 
eral references. Japan : Trade During the War, United States Tariff Commission Report 
(Washington, 1921), is a study of Japanese trade from 1913 to 1917 with special reference 
to the trade of Japan with the United States. The following works should also be con- 
sulted upon the subjects indicated by their titles: T. W. Overlach, Foreign Financial 
Control in China (New York, 1919) ; Mongton Chih Hsu, Raihvay Problems in China 
(New York, 1915) ; E. T. Williams, "The Open Ports of China," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 9, 1920, 
pp. 306-334. E. A. Ross, The Changing Chinese (New York, 1911), describes China as 
seen by a sociologist. 

The three following works are recommended for a survey of contemporary Japanese 
history (the last two are by Japanese) : K. S. Latourette, The Development of Japan, 
(New York, 1918) ; Count S. Okuma, Fifty Years of Neiv Japan. 2 vols. (New York, 1909) ; 
G. E. Uyehara, The Political Development of Japan, 1867-1909 (London, 1910). For a 



Bibliography 597 

study of Japanese emigration statistics see Ernst Schultze, "Die Japanische Auswan- 
derung," Peter. MUL, Vol. 61, 1915, pp. 129-133, 175-179, 270-276, 301-308, and the note 
by R. BiASUTTi, "L'Emigrazione Giapponese," Rivisia Geogr. Ilaliana, Vol. 61, 1916, 
pp. 210-216. K. K. Kawakami, Asia at the Door : A Study of the Japanese Question in 
Continental United States, Hawaii, and Canada (New York, 1914), is written by an assimi- 
lated (Americanized) Japanese. R. Malcolm Keir, "Modern Korea," Bull. Amer. Geogr. 
Soc., Vol. 46, 1914, pp. 756-769, 817-830, discusses the resources and problems of the 
region. Alleyne Ireland, The Far Eastern Tropics (Boston, 1905), consists of a group 
of studies of the administration of Hongkong, Malay States, French Indo-China, Java, 
the Phihppine Islands, etc. 

CHAPTER XXXII. AUSTRALIA 

Among a number of important works by Griffith Taylor may be mentioned the 
following: A Geography of Australasia (Oxford, 1914); The Australian Environment (Mel- 
bourne, 1918) ; "The Settlement of Tropical Australia," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 8, 1919, pp. 84- 
115. G. H. ScHOLEFiELD, The Pacific : Its Past and Future (London, 1919),- is an excellent 
general work. Among others may be mentioned : H. H. Bancroft, The New Pacific 
(New York, 1912 ; first publ. 1899) ; James Colwell, editor, A Century in the Pacific 
(London, 1914), "a review of the developments in the South Pacific during the past hundred 
years " ; it has an extensive bibliography. On the history of Australia see : A. Wyatt 
TiLBY, Australasia, 1688-1911 (London, 1912) ; T. A. Coghlan, Labour and Industry in 
Australia from the First Settlement in 1788 to the Establishment of the Commonwealth in 1901, 
4 vols. (London, 1918), a somewhat encyclopedic industrial history of Austraha. The 
Commonwealth of Australia publishes an exceptionally valuable Yearbook compiled under 
the direction of the Commonwealth Statistician, G. H. Knibbs. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. AFRICA 

Acquaintance with the work done by Sir Harry Johnston is absolutely necessary for 
any one interested'in African problems. Among his many published works may be men- 
tioned the following: The Opening Up of Africa (1911) ; A History of the Colonization of 
Africa by Alien Races (Cambridge, 1913); British Central Africa (London, 1897); George 
Grenfell and the Congo, 2 vols. (1908) ; Liberia, 2 vols. (1906) ; The Uganda Protectorate, 
2 vols. (1902). J. S. Keltie, The Partition of Africa, 2d ed. (London, 1895), gives an ex- 
cellent statement of the problems of political geography as they presented themselves in 
Africa during the nineteenth century. N. D. Harris, Intervention and Colonization in 
Africa (New York, 1914), contains a history of the continent since the beginning of white 
exploitation. The treaty documents for the period up to the end of 1908 are to be found 
in Sir Edward Hertslet, The Map of Africa by Treaty, 3 vols., with a portfolio of maps, 
3d ed. (London, 1909). C. H. Stigand, Administration in Tropical Africa (London, 1914), 
outlines the problems connected with the government of African tropical dependencies. 
Sir Patrick Manson, Tropical Diseases : A Manual of the Diseases of Warm Climates, 
5th ed. (London, 1914). For a brief but detailed description of the resources, trade 
routes, and future value of eastern tropical Africa, with special reference to white settle- 
ment, see G. F. Scott-Elliot, Journ. Royal Soc. of Arts, Vol. 68, 1920, pp. 315-329. 
Sir Charles Metcalfe, "Railway Development of Africa, Present and Future," Geogr. 
Journ., Vol. 47, 1916, pp. 3-21, contains a history of early railroad projects and a' record 
of achievements to date. 

CHAPTER XXXIV. LATIN AMERICA 

WiLHELM Sievers, Slid- und Mitielamerika, 3d ed. (Leipzig and Vienna, 1914), is the 
best general geographical reference work on the subject. For a historical background the 



598 Tlie New World 

best reference is E, G. Bourne, Spain in America, 1^50-1580 (New York, 1904) ; it also 
contains an exceptionally valuable critical essay on authorities. F. Garcia Caldebon, 
Latin America : Us Rise and Progress (New York, 1913), is written by a Peruvian diplomat ; 
it discusses "the German, North American, and Japanese perils," and other problems of 
Latin America. Viscount Bryce, Observations and Impressions (New York, 1912), 
presents a closely interwoven account of the historical setting of the Latin-American 
peoples and present economic, social, and political conditions. E. A. Ross, South oj 
Panama (New York, 1915), is a survey of the peoples of Latin America by an observant 
sociologist. The volume on Colombia by Eder, in Scribner's South American Series, is an 
authoritative work. W. R. Shepherd, Latin America (New York, 1914), is a concise 
treatment of the essential historical facts and contains a useful bibliography. A. B. Hart, 
The Monroe Doctrine: An Interpretation (Boston, 1916), traces the historical development 
of the doctrine since its proclamation. Pierre Berne, L'Immigration Enropeenne en 
Argentine (Paris, 1915), is an account of the European settlements. Among works on 
Argentina the following are noteworthy: Pierre Denis, La Republique Argentine: La 
Mise en Valeur-du Pays (Paris, 1920) ; Jules Huret, En Argentine, 2 vols. (Paris, 1912- 
1913). W. S. Tower, "The Pampa of Argentina," Geogr. Rev., Vol. 5, 1918, pp. 293-315, 
is an informing article with maps. The Boundary betiveen Bolivia and Peru (London, 1918), 
treats of the newly surveyed zone north of Titicaca long in dispute between these two 
republics ; it contains recent and valuable maps. Sir Thomas H. Holdich, The Countries 
of the King's Award (London, 1901), describes the Andes of Argentina and Chile, and the 
boundary settlement made there by the award of the King of England after a field study 
under the auspices of the Royal Geographical Society. Pierre Denis, Brazil in the 
Twentieth Century (New York, 1910), is one of the best books yet published on any South 
American subject. B. L. Miller and J. T. Singewald, The Mineral Deposits of South 
America (New York, 1919), is one of the most recent and comprehensive works of its kind. 
The South American Year Book (London), deals especially with the railroads of the continent. 
The Argentine Year Book (Buenos Aires), though dealing primarily with Argentina, also 
contains chapters on Uruguay, Paraguay, and Chile. 



APPENDIX 



PRINCIPAL TREATIES AND AGREEMENTS, 1814-1920 

The list includes chiefly those treaties and agreements that are mentioned in 
the text. For detailed lists of treaties and agreements, with texts and maps, 
see Sir Edward Herts let, The Map of Europe by Treaty, in foiir volumes, 
of which volumes 1-3 were pubhshed in 1875, volume 4 in 1891. See also 
the same author's The Map of Africa by Treaty, in thi-ee volumes, with port- 
folio of maps (1909). An indispensable reference for the student of poHtical 
geography is Anderson and Hershey, Handbook for the Diplomatic History 
of Europe, Asia and Africa, 1870-19M (1918) ; in one hundred and sixty main 
sections with several subdivisions each, are listed practically all the inter- 
national acts essential to a knowledge of territorial problems. The introduc- 
tion, the running text-comment, and the convenient and logical arrangement 
of the whole make it unusually valuable in spite of the absence of an index. 



DATE 


NAME 


SIGNATORIES 


TEEMS OF IMPOKTANCE IN THIS BOOK 


1814 


First Treaty of Paris 


Austria, France, Great 


Provided for calling of Vienna 




(following depor- 


Britain, Portugal, 


Congress 




tation of Napoleon 


Prussia, Russia, Spain, 






to Elba) 


Sweden 




1814- 


Congress of Vienna 


As above 


Determined the main lines of 


1815 






the map of Europe as they 
stood in the 19 th century 


1815 


Second Treaty of 


As Eibove 


France ceded certain bits of 




Paris (following 




territory on her eastern 




Waterloo) 




frontier and paid an in- 
demnity 


1839 


Treaty of London 


Austria, Belgium, 


Belgiuni's neutrality 




(the "scrap of 


France, Great Britain, 


guaranteed 




paper") 


Netherlands, Prussia, 
Russia 




1856 


Treaty of Paris 


Austria, France, Great 


Independence and integrity of 




(close of Crimean 


Britain, Prussia, Rus- 


Turkey guaranteed. 




War) 


sia, Sardinia, Turkey 


Danube internationalized. 
Bessarabia annexed to 
Russia. Rumania under 
Turkish suzerainty. Serbia 
given a large degree of 
autonomy. Aland Islands 
to be unfortified. 


1859 


Zurich 


Austria, France, Sardinia 


Beginning of unification of 
Italy 


1864 


Vienna 


Austria, Denmark, 


Cession of Slesvig-Holstein 






Prussia 


to Prussia and Austria 


1866 


Prague 


Austria, Prussia 


German Confederation dis- 
solved. Austria renounced 
rights to Slesvig-Holstein, 
and consented to union of 
Lombardy and Venetia 
with Italian kingdom 



599 



600 



The New World 



1871 



1878 



1878 



1879 
1882 
1885 



1898 

1904 

1905 
1907 

1912 



Frankfort (close of 
Franco-Prussian 
War) 

San Stefano 



Congress of Berlin 



Formation of Dual 
Alliance 

Formation of Triple 
Alliance 

Berlin Act 



Paris (close of 
Spanish-American 
War) 

Anglo-French 
Convention 

London 
The Hague 

Lausanne 



SIGNATORIES 



France, Germany 



Russia, Turkey 



Austria-Hungary, 
France, Germany, 
Great Britain, Italy, 
Russia, Turkey 



Germany £md Austria 

Germany, Austria, 
Italy 

Austria-Himgary, 
Belgium, Denmark, 
France, Germany, 
Great Britain, Italy, 
Netherlands, Portugal, 
Russia, Spain, Sweden, 
Turkey, United States 

Spain, United States 



Basis of the Entente 
Cordiale 

Alliance between Great 

Britain and Japan 
Delegates of 44 countries 



Italy, Turkey 



Cession of Alsace-Lorraine to 
Germany. Indemnity of 
5,000,000,000 francs paid 
by France 

Serbia, Montenegro, and 
Bulgaria enlarged. Russia 
obtained Bessarabia and 
Transcaucasian territory. 
The opposition of the 
powers led to the Congress 
of Berhn and the modifica- 
tion of the treaty of San 
Stefano 

Eastern Rumeha formed. 
Austro-Hungarian occupa- 
tion of Bosnia and Herze- 
govina authorized. Inde- 
pendence of IVIontenegro 
and of Serbia recognized 
under enlarged boundaries. 
Rumanian independence 
recognized. Districts of 
Ardahan, Kars, and Batum 
ceded to Russia. Turkey 
promised reforms in Armenia 



Spheres of influence in Africa 
laid down. Formation of 
neutral Congo Free State. 
Free trade area in Africa 
defined. Declaration pro- 
hibiting the slave trade 

Independence of Cuba 
recognized. Porto Rico, 
Guam, and the Phihppines 
ceded to the United States 



Second Hague Conference^ for 
the peaceful settlement of 
international disputes 

Annexation of TripoU (Libya) 
by Italy. Occupation of 
Dodecanese by Italy 



1 The first Hague Conference (1899) had a similar though more restricted program. 



Appendix 



601 



DATE 


NAME 


SIGNATORIES 


TERMS 


1913 


London 


Bulgaria, Greece, Mon- 


Cession by Turkey to the 






tenegro, Serbia, 


Balkan aUies of all terri- 






Turkey 


tory (except Albania) west 
of the Enos-Midia line. 
Autonomous Albania to be 
created. 


1913 


Bucarest 


As above, with Rumania 
added, and without 
Turkey 


Frontiers as shown in Fig. 150 


1915 


Secret Treaty of 


France, Great Britain, 


Italy to enter the war, and 




London 


Italy, Russia 


to receive the Trentino, 
Istria, a large part of Dal- 
matia and the Adriatic 
islands, Valona in Albania, 
a sphere of influence in 
Turkey, and territory in 
Africa if the other signa- 
tories made gains there 


1916 


Sykes-Picot Agree- 


France, Great Britain 


Provided for spheres of in- 




ment 




fluence in Turkey. Later 
a new agreement included 
Italy, and provision was 
made for Russia (Fig. 47) 


1918 


Treaty of Brest- 


Central Powers, Russia 


Russia withdrew from the war 




Litovsk 




and renounced her right to 
Baltic Provinces, Poland, 
and certain districts in the 
Caucasus 


1918 


Bucarest 


Central Powers, Rumania 


Rumania to withdraw from 
the war, and to cede certain 
districts to Austria-Hun- 
gary. Treaty was never 
ratified 


1919 


Versailles 


AUied and Associated 
Powers, Germany 


See chapter on Germany 


1919 


St. Germain-en- 


Allied and Associated 


See chapter on Austria 




Laye 


Powers, Austria 




1919 


Neuilly 


Allied and Associated 
Powers, Bulgaria 


See chapter on Bulgaria 


1920 


Trianon 


AlUed and Associated 
Powers, Hungary 


See chapter on Hungary 


1920 


Sevres 


Allied Powers, Turkey 


See chapter on Turkey *¥■' 


1920 


Tripartite Agree- 


France, Great Britain, 


Determined spheres of in- 




ment 


Italy 


fluence in Turkey (Fig. 48) 



Agreement among Allied Powers whereby Rumania receives Bessarabia, subject 
to later discussion by Russia 



1920 


Riga 


Poland, Russia 


Eastern boundary of Poland 
and Polish control of East- 
ern Galicia 


1920 


Rapallo 


Italy Jugo-Slavia 


Settlement of Adriatic ques- 
tion. See chapter on Jugo- 
slavia 


1920 


Franco-British 


France, Great Britain 


Division of mandated terri- 




Agreement 




tory in Syria. See chapter 
on Palestine 



602 



The New World 



The Russian Soviet (Bolshevist) government has concluded, among others, the following 
treaties of peace with former parts of the Russian Empire : ^ 



COUNTRY 


DATE 


PLACE 


Esthonia 

Lithuania 

Latvia 

Poland 

Finland 


2 February 1920 
12 July 1920 

11 August 1920 

12 October 1920 
14 October 1920 


Dorpat 

Moscow 

Moscow 

Riga 

Dorpat 



Each treaty recognizes the territorial limits of the state in question or provides for future 
settlement. 

* For details see the chapters on the respective countries in the liat. 



INDEX 



INDEX 



Abadan, 74, 468 

ABC powers, 562 

Abdul Hamid II, 432 

Abo, 373 

Abyssinia, 532, 555, 557; Italy and, 140; 
unique position, 557 

Acknowledgments, ii 

Acre River, 570 

Ada-Kalessi, 287 

Adalia, 140, 321, 434 

Adana, 434; massacres, 433 

Adde (iU.), 170 

Aden, 29, 72, 160, 555; region (map), 556 

Adowa, 140 

Adrianople, 221, 251, 296, 298, 318, 320, 
327, 440; treaty of, 278, 314 

Adriatic Sea, Austria and, 207, 215; dif- 
ferences between the two sides, 263; 
in Pact of Corfu, 258; Italy's claim, 259, 
261; Italy's control, 270 

Adriatic Sea, east coast, ethnic elements 
(map), 260; final settlement of disputed 
territory, 269; harbors, character, 266; 
Italian culture, 262; Italy and, 131; 
rival claims, 259 

^gean coast, 304 

j^gean Islands, 417 

yEgean Sea, Greeks and, 313, 321 

Afghanistan, 465, 470, 483; British policy 
in, 484; independence movement, 484; 
Kabul wall (ill.), 486; near Baluchistan 
border (ill.)> 487; Russian and Indian 
railways, proposed connections (map), 
485 

Africa, Belgium's gains by the war, 124; 
bibliography, 597; British possessions 
(map), 42; colonial expansion and 
struggle for raw materials, 532; colonies 
loyal in the war, 532-533; early 
colonial rivalry, 540; former German 
colonies, 541, 199 (map); French inter- 
ests in northern, 105, 551; French 
possessions (map), 106; germ diseases 
and insects, 538; German ambitions, 
199-200; German colonial expansion, 
198; international regulations, 548, 550 
(map); Islamism in, 534; Islamism 
versus Christianity in northern, 535; 



Africa (continued) 

Italian colonies, 140; mandate principle 
in settlement of problems, 546; minor 
interests and problems, 552; native 
welfare and control, 548; negroes, 533; 
negroes, conversion to Islam, 54, 56; 
partition by great powers, 540; popula- 
tion density in central (map), 538; 
Portuguese colonies, 159, 160 (map); 
races and cultures, 533 ; slave and liquor 
traffic, 548; sleeping sickness localities 
(map), 539; Spanish possessions (map), 
153; Stanley's explorations, 540; threat 
to peace of the world, 541; trade poli- 
cies, 547; tropical prod uQts, 537; Turkey 
and northern, 113; Uganda region 
(map), 538; white control, effect on 
natives, 535; white penetration, history, 
539; white man's lands in central, 536, 
537 (map) 

Africa, West, 553, 554 (map); British in, 
553, 554; commercial rivalry, 554; 
resources, 555 

Africans, growing self-consciousness, 532 

Agadir, 107, 541, 545, 553 

Agram, 257 

Agriculture, nomads' idea of, 474 

Al Hasa, 68 

Aland Islands, 173, 374, 375 

Alaska, 520 

Albania, 132, 249, 317; Austrian and Ser- 
bian rivalry, 308; bibliography, 592, 
boundaries, various proposed (map), 
307; brigandage, 311; centers of inter- 
est, 310; character of country, 306; 
division proposed, 308, 309 (map); 
ethnography, religions, and boundaries 
(map), 310; feuds, 306; foreign control; 
309; Italy's interest, 144, 306, 309, 
Jugo-Slavia and, 257; mountaineers, 306; 
people, distribution, 310; union, plan 
of, 311 

Albania, southern. See Epirus, northern 

Albanians, Serbs and, 257; view of Greek 
control, 325 

Albert, Bishop, 362 

Albertville, 128 

Aleppo, 70, 102, 412, 429 



605 



606 



The New World 



Aleutian Islands, 404, 522 

Alexander the Great, 313, 316 

Alexander II, 384 

Alexandretla, 398, 412, 410 

Alexandrovsk, 370, 373, 398, 412 

Alfold, 226, 227 (map) 

Alfonso XIII, 145, 153 

Algeciras, 106, 110 

Algeria, 532, 535, 540; desert interior (ill.), 
117; European population, 114; exports, 
114; French control, 113; oasis in the 
gorge of Kantara (ill.), 116; physio- 
graphic zones, 111; relief belt (map), 113 

Algiers, 551 

Alhambra (ill.), 151 

Ali Dinar, 65 

Alien rule, 59 

Allenby, Sir Edmund, 100 

Allenstein, 194, 332, 339, 345 

Allied and Associated Powers, minorities 
treaties, 276; Russian policy, 390, 391 

Alsace, 81 

Alsace-Lorraine, 196; mineral resources and 
water communications (map), 82; re- 
ligious leaning, 81; returii to France, 80 

Amazon valley, 559 

Ambassadors, Coimcil of, 347 

American Colonization Society, 558 

American Geographical Society, ii; Guate- 
mala-Honduras boundary, 579 

American quadrilateral, 522, 523 (map) 

American Revolution, 29; Irish immigrants 
and, 33 

Amritsar, 44 

Amu Daria district, 474 

Amur River, 404, 517, 518 

Anatolia, 320, 321, 425, 429; bibliography, 
595; commercial prospects, 443; in 
terms of American locations (map), 65; 
irrigation, 443; Italy and, 102, 103, 132, 
144; natural hmits, 442; ports, 443; 
relief (map), 428; Smyrna and, 322 
Turkish elements, 443. See also Turkey 
Ancon, treaty of, 573 
Andalusia, 145 
Andermatt (ill.), 183 

Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, 29, 535; compara- 
tive distances (map), 64; extent and 
boundaries (map), 63; law and people, 
62; Mohammedanism, 57 
Anglo-French convention, 1904, 600 
Anglo-Japanese alliance, 26, 496 
Anglo-Persian Oil Co., 467 



Anglo-Persian treaty, chief provisions, 468- 
469 

Angola, 158, 160, 162, 164 

Angra Pequena, 199 

Annam, 518 

Ansarirebs, 92 

Antimony, 508 

Antofagasta, 572, 574 (map) 

Antwerp, 123, 124 

Arabi Pasha, 60 

Arabia, British influence, 71; British inter- 
ests, 65 ; in terms of American locations 
(map), 65; intolerance and exclusive- 
ness, 66; isolation, 65, 66; population, 
66, 67; Turkey and, 426; unity, 68, 69 

Arabs, 429; Anezeh tribe in Syrian desert 
(ill.), 430; desert, 104; in Anglo-Egyp- 
tian Sudan, 62; in Libya, 142; in Spain, 
150; migration into Africa and Spain, 
533; Portuguese and, 160; Syria and, 
103, lot; typical costume (ill.), 447 

Arad, 284 

Aral Sea, 470, 472 

Aras, 458 

Arbitration of boundary disputes in Latin 
America, 579, 580 

Archangel, 370 

Arco (ill.), 133 

Ardahan, 450 

Argentina, British Interests, 566; Chilean 
boundary, 570; Uruguay and La Plata 
estuary, 576 

Argyrocastro, 310 

Arica, Morro de (ill.), 576 

Arid regions, German Southwest Africa, 544; 
Inner Asia, 470; nitrate fields in Chile, 
573; Spain (map), 149 

Armageddon, 1 

Armenia, 397, 411, 417, 429, 434, 450; 
America ajid, 459-460; boundary, claims 
and limits (with map), 458, 460; ethnog- 
raphy and boundaries (map), 459; man- 
datary difficulty, 458; plight, 455 

Armenians, 379, 429, 453; as element of 
Turkey (map), 426; dependence on 
outside support, 460; deportations and 
massacres, 459; France and, 102; Kurds 
and, 444; Tatar treaty, 455 

Arms, trade with small osturbulent nations, 
486 

Artesian areas in Australia (with map), 528 
Asia, railway lines in western (map), 377; 
Russian extension into, 398 



Index 



607 



Asia, Inner, aridity, 470; bibliography, 596; 
camel transportation (ill.), 488; heart, 
477; nomadic movements, 471; rainfall 
(map), 472; relief (map), 471; Russian 
advance into, 474; typical transporta- 
tion (iU.), 481 

Asia, southeastern, focus of American, 
British, French, Dutch, and Japanese 
interests (map), 25, 520 

Asia Minor. See Anatolia; Turkey 

Asiatic Turkey, classification of peoples, 427 

Asiatics, Australia and, 525, 528, 530 

Asiatics Trading and Land Act, 39 

Asir, 68, 71 

Assab, 140 

Assam, 49 

Astrakhan, 393 

Athens, cosmopolitan character, 409 

Atlas Mountains, 551 

Attica, 314 

Attila, 433 

Aussig (ill.), 237 

Australia, 29, 520; artesian areas and rain- 
fall (with map), 528; Asiatic labor, 525, 
528, 530; bibliography, 597; fears of 
Japan, 492-493; Japanese advance 
toward, 526; Japanese question, 525; 
Japanese trade, 498; physical conditions, 
526; population, 528; population den- 
sity (map), 530; race problem (with 
map), 525; wheat harvest (ill.), 527 

Australian Commonwealth, 528 

Austria, 191; bibliography, 590; boundary 
(new) and cities (map), 207; Czech 
oppression, 235; economic weakness, 
212; emigration, 210-211; ethnic dif- 
ferences, 210; food and fuel problems, 
212; fragmentation, 208; German co- 
operation, 187; Hungary boundary, 215; 
Italy and, 130-131, 136; national exis- 
tence, 206; population density and 
shape (map), 209; population, nation- 
ality and religions (table), 210; present 
territory, 208; St. Germain treaty 
terms, 214-215; Slesvig and, 175; Swit- 
zerland and, 185; union with Germany 
forbidden, 192; union with Germany, 
possibilities, 214; western provinces 
and Switzerland (map), 185 
Austria-Hungary, 206, 216; division and 

allotment of territory (map), 206 
Austrian Poland. See under Poland 
Autocracy, 203; Russia, 385 



Avignon, Papacy at, 236 
Avlona. See Valona 

Azerbaijan, 380, 397, 434, 440, 450, 453, 
455, 461; Persian, 464; Republic, 460 

Bab el Mandeb, 71, 556 
Backa, 273; ethnography (map), 272 
Bagdad, 252 

Bagdad railway, 411, 412, 444 
Bahama Islands, 569 
Bahrein Island, 71 
Baikal, Lake, 404 

Baku, 380, 385, 397, 398, 453 455, 460 
Balkan countries, 249; bibliography, 591; 
changes of territory as result of Balkan 
Wars (map), 297; economic features, 
252; Germano- Austrian interests and, 
252; hatreds, 298, 305; nationalism, 
251, 252 
Balkan peninsula, natural regions (map), 

254 
Balkan War, First, 250, 296 
Balkan War, Second, 251, 298 
Balkan Wars, 433-434; Bulgaria and, 296, 

298; Greece and, 315 
Baltchik, 302 

Baltic and White Sea Conference, 165 
Baltic Confederation, 165; Lithuania and, 

361 
Baltic Port, 369 
Baltic Sea, 165; Britain and, 369; Polish 

corridor to, 336 
Baltic States, 362; bibliography, 593; 
boundaries (map), 363; German delay 
in evacuating, 365; German penetra- 
tion, 188 (map), 189, 382; Germaniza- 
tion, 364, 368; international position, 
369; self-government, 362. See also 
Courland; Esthonia; Latvia 
Baits, 189, 365, 368 
Baluchistan, 465, 484, 485-486; near 

Afghan border (ill.), 487 
Banana lands, 579 

Banat, 216, 219, 221, 255, 287; ethnography 
(map), 272; Serbia's claim, 272, 2/3, 
290 
Bantus, 533 

Barbados, white control, 535 
Barcelona, 145, 146, 147, 153 
Barkhans, 470 
Basques, 150, 151 
Basra, 72, 412, 440 
Basutoland, 39, 43 



608 



The New World 



Basutos, 38 

Batang, 489 

Batum, 410, 451, 453, 455, 458; harbor 
(ill.), 457 

Batuni, province of, 450 

Bazaa rat Faizabad (ill.), 478-479 

Bear Island, 171, 172 

Bechuanaland, 39, 43 

Beira, 161 

Beirut, 100 

Belgian Congo, 125, 126, 532, 542, 553; rail 
and water transportation (map), 127; 
value, 127 

Belgium, as center of field of conflict — 
French and German defenses (map), 
121; as European focus, 119; bibliog- 
raphy, 587; claims to adjacent terri- 
tory, 123; Holland and, 178; indepen- 
dence, 119; industrial power, 120; 
language problem, 122; recovery from 
the war, 120, 122; territorial gsdns from 
the war, 124 

Belgrade, 258, 272 

Benes, Edward, 240 

Benghazi, 142, 143, 549 

Benguela, 161 

Berbera, 557 

Berbers, 113, 150, 533; in Libya, 142 

Bering Sea, 404 

Berhn, Congress of, 1878, signatories and 
terms, 600 

Berlin Act, 1885, signatories and terms, 600 

Berlin-Bagdad route, 73 

Berlin Conference of 1884^85, 549, 550 

Berlin General Act of 1880, 201 

Bessarabia, 279, 280, 287; agreement 
about, among Allied Powers, 1920, 601; 
Jews, 381; people, 288 

Bethlehem, 421 

Bibliography, general list of works, 583 

Big game in Africa, protection, 550 

Bilbao, 153 

Birth rate in France and Germany, 87 

Bismarck Archipelago, 201 

Bitlis, 458 

Black race, 533. See also Africa; Negroes 

Black Sea federation, 398 

Boers, 35, 36, 540 

Bogota, treaty of, 579 

Bohemia, 191, 208, 209; Austrian. oppres- 
sion, 238; literary revival, 238; religious 
wars, 235. See also Czecho-Slovakia 

Bohemian basin, 242-243 



Bohemian language, 236, 238 

Bokhara, 474, 475, 476 

Bolivia, boundary disputes with Peru and 
Brazil, 570; boundary with Paraguay, 
576; boundary with Peru, 577: claim 
for seaport, 574; race mixture, 563 

Bolshevism, 7, 376, 387; fight against, 389; 
Hungary, 224; program, 390; Rumania, 
292, 294; Transcaucasia, 455 

Bolshevists, Baltic States and, 365; block- 
ade of the Allies, 390; Eastern Turkes- 
tan and, 480; German, 202; Germany 
and, 189; Persia and, 466; Transcau- 
casia and, 460, 461; Turkey and, 461 

Boma, 128 

Bombay, 49 

Bonin Islands, 524 

Bora, 266 

Border states of Russia, separation, 395 

Bosilegrad, 255, 302, 304 

Bosnia, 187, 207, 252, 425, 434; land prob- 
lem, 275 

Bosporus, 409, 414, 415 

Botha, General Louis, 36, 37 

Boundaries, ii; Albania, 307 (map), 308; 
central Europe, changes (map), 6; cen- 
tral Europe, conflicting claims (map), 
4; changeableness, 5; Greece, 313; 
ethnic basis, 261; Jugo-Slavia, 253, 270 
(map); length of old and new, 3; Po- 
land, 332; Rumania, 281, 284; conces- 
sions in China, 510; South American 
friction, 570, 571 (map) 

Boyana River, 271 

Braden, 566 

Brahmins, 54 

Braila, 294 

Brazil, Japanese in, 492; Portugal and, 158, 
159 

Bremen, 198 

Brenner Pass, 134; region (iil.), 135 

Breslau, 193 

Brest-Li to vsk, 351 

Brest-Litovsk, treaty of 1818, 189, 204, 
364, 395; Signatories and terms, 601 

Britain and British Empire, Afghan policy, 
484; African possessions, loyalty, 533 
Arabian interests, 65; Baltic policy, 369 
bibliography, 585; dominions, 29 
Egypt and, 58; Egypt, new policy, 61 
Empire building, process, 22; Empire 
in relation to its parts, 28; expansion. 



Index 



609 



Britain and British Empire (continued) 
two theories of, 7S; Far East and raw 
materials, 490; fate of lost possessions, 
35; gains from the war, 14, 16; growth 
of the Empire, 13 (map), 14, 22, 24; 
Government of India Bill, 53; imperial 
idea, 29, 30; imperial policy, 28; In- 
dian problems, 43; Japanese alliance, 
26; Mesopotamia and, 72, 75; Mo- 
hammedanism and, 54, 55, 57; Near 
East trade, 416; oil fuel, dependence on, 
468; Pacific realm, 521; Palestine and, 
418; Persian interests, 462; Polish 
interests, 356; principle of native rights, 
41; problems of the Empire, 12, 28; 
raw materials in 1914, 14, 15; Reforms 
BiU, 53; road to India, 55, 58, 70, 71, 
72, 429-430, 465, 520; sea-borne coal 
trade, 23 (map), 24; sea power and Em- 
pire growth, 22; South American inter- 
ests, 565-566; territorial inflation, 12; 
territorial protection on landward side, 
14; three groups outside British Isles, 
29; Tibetan interests, 487; trade or- 
ganization, 16; trade policy basis, 26; 
tripartite agreement in Near East in 
1920 (map), 103; Turkish-sphere of 
influence, 434; war debt, and how it 
can be paid, 27 

British Columbia, Japanese question, 492 

British East Africa, 42, 533, 542 

British Empire. See Britain 

British Isles, dependence upon coal, 16, 18 
(map). See also United Kingdom 

British South Africa Co., 41, 42 

British West Africa, 554 

Bromberg, 191 

Bromberg canal, 342 

Brothers of the Sword, 362 

Brusa, 440 

Brussels Conference of 1876, 548 

Brussels Conference of 1890, 549, 550 

Bubonic plague, 539 

Bucarest, French influence, 280 

Bucarest, treaty of, 1913, 204, 251, 280, 281; 
signatories and terms, 601 

Buccari, 266 

Budapest, 218, 225, 480; occupation by 
Rumanian troops in 1919, 291; view 
(iU.), 220-221 

Buenos Aires, 576; disputed entrance 
(map), 578 



Buffer states, Luxemburg, 84; Persia, 467; 
Poland, 189; Rhineland, 81 (map), 82; 
Siam (with map), 518; Switzerland, 181 

Buga (iU.), 171 

Bukovina, 208, 224, 287; people, 288 

Buldur, 144 

Bulgaria, 249, 434; ambitions, 295; Bal- 
kan Wars and, 251; boundaries, new, 
303 (map), 304; church, 317; debt, 302; 
First Balkan War, 296; future problem, 
300; Greece and, 305, 315; Macedonia 
and, 316; NeuiUy, treaty of, and, 300, 
303, 304; Second Balkan War, 298; 
Serbia and, 302; territorial develop- 
ment, 1878-1919 (maps), 299; territorial 
losses in the World War (map), 303; 
Thrace and, 320; World War and, 298 

Bulgars, 249 

Burma, 53 

Bushire, 68 

Byzantine Empire, 414 

Cabinda, 162, 163 (iU.) 

Cabral, P. A. de, 158 

Calcutta, 49 

California, Japanese question, 492, 505 

Caliphate, Turkish, 441 

Camels, in Mongolian caravans, 482; trans- 
portation in Inner Asia (ill.), 488 

Cameroons, 199, 200, 533, 541, 545 (map), 
553; British and French division, 544; 
France and, 91 ; products, 544 

Canada, 29 

Canton, 510 

Cape-to-Cairo railway, 42 (map), 125, 552 

Cape Town, 39, 540, 551 

Cape Verde Islands, 158 

Capitulations, Turkish policy of, 417, 436 

Caprivi salient, 541, 553 

Caqueta River, 578 

Caravans, 473, 479; camel caravan march- 
ing toward Smyrna (ill.), 325; Kurds 
and, 446, 447; Mongoha, 482; Pales- 
tine, 422; Smyrna, 322 

Caribbean Sea, United States interests, 569 ; 
United States penetration (map), 560 

Carniola, 259, 264, 269 

CaroUne Islands, 202, 497, 506, 522, 523 

Carpathian Mountains, 278, 281 

Casablanca, 110; airplane photograph (ill.), 
Ill 

Caspian Sea, 397, 470, 475 

Caste in India, 45 (map), 46, 47 



610 



The New World 



Castelnuovo, 266 

Castelorizzo, 132, 141 

Castilian, 151 

Catalan, 151 

Catalonia, 145 

Catherine Harbor, 370 

Cattaro, 257, 266. 271, 272 

Caucasus, 385, 397, 431, 451, 453 (map); 
Germans, 382 

Central America, attempts at confedera- 
tion, 581; United States influence, 567 

Central American Court of Justice, 562 

Central Asia. See Asia, Inner 

Central Europe, Allied help to new states, 
239; conflicting territorial claims (map), 
4; socialistic background of democratic 
and individualistic movements, 394; 
territorial changes due to the war 
(map), 6 

Centralization, France, 89; Jugo-Slavia, 
259 

Cerro de Pasco, 566 

Chafarinas, 155 

Chaihia, 116 

Changes, 5 

Charles, ex-Emperor, 206, 225 

Charles X, 119 

Charlotte Amelie, city and harbor (ill.), 563 

Chatalja, 251, 296 

Cherso, 269 

Chile, Argentine boundary, 570; nitrate 
fields and boundary dispute (with map), 
572; nitrate production, 573; persecu- 
tion of Peruvians, 573; Peru boundary, 
572, 573; race mixture, 563; United 
States relations, 566, 567 

China, 490; as prey of western nations, 496; 
bibliography, 596; British interests, 488; 
cause of present weakness, 507; com- 
mercial power, possible, 515; compared 
with the United States (map), 508; 
concessions, 508, 510, 512, 513; Con- 
sortium, 513; disorder, 514; Eastern 
Turkestan and, 477, 480; five major 
problems, 507; foreign powers' pene- 
tration, 508; foreigners' concessions and 
privileges, 512; foreign spheres of in- 
fluence, 508, 510; four factions, 514; 
French in, 518; German losses, 196, 197; 
internjil administration, 513; invasion 
of her sovereignty, 513; Japanese pene- 
tration, 497; Japanese war in 1894-95, 
495; judicial system, 514; Mongolia 



China (continued) 

and, 480; open ports and marts (map), 
511; population density by provinces 
(map), 515; railways, 516, 519; repub- 
lic, 488, 513; resources, 508; revolution 
of 1911, 483, 488, 514; Russian conflict, 
478; tariff and transit dues, 512; tariff 
revision needed, 515-516; Tibet and, 
488; trade, Eiu-opean nations and, 510, 
511 (map), 512; trade with Russia, 482; 
treaty ports, 510; United States as- 
sistance, 514; United States role with, 
497; United States trade, 513. iSee also 
Shantung 

Chinchas Islands, 566 

Chinese Eastern Railway, 498, 516, 51.7 

Chinese Republic, 488, 513 

Chinese Revolution, 483, 488, 514 

Chinwangtau, 510 

Cholera, 539 

Christian IX, 175 

Christian religion, 420 

Chuquicamata, 566 

Cities of international character, 409 

City-state, 314 

Clayton-Bulwer treaty, 567 

Coal, British coaling stations, 24; British 
dependence on, 16, 18 (map); German 
coal and French iron ore, 89; German 
losses, 193; Hungary, 226; Italy, 136; 
Jugo-SIavia, 272, 273; Russia, 401; 
Saar region, 84; sea-borne trade of the 
world (map), 23; Silesia and Teschen 
(with map), 346; Spitsbergen, 171; 
Westphalia, 89; world production and 
consumption in 1913 (cartogram), 10 

Coimbra, 156 

Colombia, boundary with Ecuador-Peru, 
578; boundary with Venezuela, 577; 
British interests, 566; United States 
relations, 567-568 

Colonia, Uruguay, 578 

Colonial organizers, 12 

Colonies, Africa and raw materials, 532; 
British, free trade and, 19; British, 
objects in the war, 29; essence of prob- 
lem of rule, 29; France, 91; French and 
Dutch distribution (map), 93; German, 
in Africa, 541; German expansion, 198 
German losses by the war, 197, 198; 
Italian, 140, 141 (map); self-govern- 
ment of Portuguese, 164 



Index 



611 



Colonization, Bailie Provinces, 364; France 
in northern Africa, 551; Russians in 
Kirghiz Steppe, 473 

Commerce. See Trade 

Commission of Inquiry, ii 

Commodities, industrial, 8, 10. See also 
Minerals; Raw materials 

Commonwealth of nations, 29 

Communism in Russia, 387 

Competition, 11 

Condominium, 529, 547 

Confederations, plans, 11, 28; Central 
America, 581 

Confucius, 507 

Congo, 541, 549 

Congo Free State, 541, 549 

Congo River, 540 

Congress Poland, 192, 351, 353 

Consortium, 513 

Constantine, Algeria (ill.)> 115 

Constantine, King of Greece, 315, 325, 327 

Constantinople, 295, 305, 398, 440; Allied 
control, 417; as a thoroughfare, 409; 
bibliography, 594; British and French 
rivalry, 415; ethnic conditions in the 
region (map), 413; free use of Straits 
desired, 412; general view (ill.), 410- 
411; Greek claims, 314, 318; Greek 
interests in, 412, 414; historic setting, 
409; latest struggle for, 412; new status, 
416; Pan-German scheme for, 411; 
population changes, 414; religious sig- 
nificance, 441; Russian desire for, 410; 
trade, 415, 416; Turks and, 414, 415 

Cook Islands, 531 

Coolgardie, 528 

Cooperation of United States and Latin 
America, 562 

Cooperative plans, 11, 28; Central America, 
581 

Cooperative societies in Russia, 384, 397 

Copenhagen, 173 

Copper, Katanga, 127; South America, 566 

Cordova, 150 

Corfu, Pact of, 257, 259; principal items, 
258 

Cossacks, 380, 473 

Cossacks of the Don, 390, 402; organiza- 
tion, 402; Turks and, 403 

Costa Rica, relations with Panama, 580 

Costanza, 294 

Cotton, Belgian Congo, 127; Fiji and Sa- 
moa, 200; Germany and, 541-542 



Council of Ambassadors, 347 

Courland, 362, 365, 368 

Covilham, J. P. da, 520 

Cracow, 351 

Crimea, 390 

Croatia, 219, 257; republic, 258 

Croats, 258, 260 

Crusades, 420; France and, 94 

Cuba, 564; United States and, 569 

Curacao, 569 

Cyprus, 144, 326 

Cyrenaica, 57, 143 

Czar, 382, 383 

Czech language, 232 

Czecho-Slovakia, 191, 218, 226; agricul- 
ture, 246; Allied help, and vitality of 
the state, 239; bibliography, 590; boun- 
daries — linguistic and political (map), 
233; dangers to the new state, 238; 
domain, 231; ethnography and coal and 
iron resources (map), 247; France and, 
87; future power, 245; Germans in, 
192; historic struggle for independence, 
232; international relations, treaties, 
etc., 231; land reform, 248; language, 
232; militarism, 210; minorities, 232;' 
National Assembly, 242; political prob- 
lems, 241; railways, 246; regional divi- 
sion — Czechs and Slovaks, 242, 243 
(map); Russian relations, 239; social 
reform, 241; Teschen and, 316; treaties, 
216 

Czecho-Slovaks, 207; in Russia in the war, 
235 

Czechs, literary revival, 238; Moravians 
and, 243; Poles and, 240 

Dacia, 282 

Daghestan, 460 

Dahomey, 547 

Dairen (Port Dalny), 410, 516, 517 

Dakar, 155 

Dalai Lama, 487; activities, 488 

Dalmatia, 207, 208, 259, 261, 263, 264; 
centers of Italian culture (map), 268; 
Jugo-Slavs and Italians in, 266; ple- 
biscite in 1919, 268 

Dalnialian coast, 132 

Dalmatian Islands, 135 

Dalny, Port. See Dairen 

Damao, 158, 160 

Damascus, 69, 70, 97; importance, 94; 
view (ill.), 101 



612 



The New World 



Damascus program, 97, 98 

Danish West Indies, 561. See also Virgin 
Islands 

D'Annunzio, Gabriele, 129, 138; Fiume and, 
268, 269 

Danube River, 207, 214, 253; Ada-Kalcssi 
island in, 287; as outlet for Czecho- 
slovakia, 244, 245 (map), 246; inter- 
nationalization, 215; Jugo-Slavia and, 
272, 273 

Danubian Confederation, 241 

Danzig, 166, 192, 194; British interests, 
356; early and present status as free 
port, 337; future of the port, 338; new 
firms, trade, etc., 340; new Free City 
government, 338; Poland and, provi- 
sions of economic agreement, 343; 
Polish corridor and, 337; port and Free 
City (map), 341; waterfront, part (ill.). 
342 

Dar es Salaam, 125, 540, 542 

Dar Hamar, 64 

Dardanelles, 409 

Darfur, 63, 65 

Dead Sea, 422 

•Dedeagatch, 327 

Dekka, 46 (ill.) 

Delagoa Bay, 161 

Delgado, Cape, 160 

Democracy, 314; central and eastern 
Europe, socialistic background, 394; 
Germany, 192, 204; Germany, rise, 191: 
Portugal, 156; Spain, 145 

Demobilization in France, 80 

Denikin, General, 333, 389, 390, 403 

Denmark, 165; colonial enterprise, 165, 
167; commerce and colonies, 173, 174 

Deserts, Chile, northern (with map), 572; 
Inner Asia, 470; Russian Turkestan, 475 

Deshima, 490, 493 

Dinaric Alps, 263 

Disarmament in Italy, 139 

Disease in Africa, tropical, 538 

Diu, 158, 160 

Djebel Hauran, 97 

Djebel Tuwaik, 66 

Djibuti, 485, 557 

Dnieper River, 357, 393; plain at Kiev 
(ill.), 386 

Dobrudja, 251, 280, 281, 287, 298, 302; 
possibility of trouble, 290 

Dodecanese, 132, 144, 263, 314, 434; Greeks 
and, 435; Italian occupation, 320 



Dominions of the British Empire, 29 

Don, the (region), 398, 401, 402; Germans, 

382 
Don Cossacks. See Cossacks of the Don 
Don River, 393, 402 
Donetz basin, 401 

Dorpat, treaty of, 366; Finland and, 370 
Drid, 116 
Drin, outlet, 255 
Drin-Scutari outlet, 266, 271 
Drin valley, 271 
Droughts in Volga region, 387. See also 

Arid regions 
Druses, 92, 100 

Dual Alliance, 1879, signatories, 600 
Duma, Russian, 385 
Dunes, Inner Asia, 470; Sahara, 117 (ill.), 

118 
Dutch, 119. See also Holland 
Dutch colonies, distribution (map), 93 
Dutch East Indies, 176; American trade, 

498; Japanese in, 495 
Dutch Harbor, 522 
Dvina River, 393 
Dyer, General, 44 

East. See Far East; Near East 

East Africa, Italy and, 140; Portuguese and, 

159 
East India Company, 43 
East Indies, Dutch in, 520 
East Prussia, 194, 359, 360 
Eastern Europe. See Europe; Russia 
Eastern Galicia. See Galicia, Eastern 
Eastern Turkestan. See Turkestan, Eastern 
Ecuador, boundary with Colombia-Peru, 

578 
Egypt, 30, 532, 540, 547; British rule, 58, 

59, 60, 548; disorders, 58; Dual Control, 

60; nationalist movement, 61, 535; 

new British policy, 61; population, 61; 

religious motive underlying disorders, 

58; Senussi influence, 57; towns, deserts, 

and cataracts (map), 59 
Ekaterinoslav, 40 
El Kantara, 412 
El Obeid, 64 

Elbe River, 244, 245, 246 
Elsenborn, 125 

Emanuel, King of Portugal, 158 
Emigration, Austria, 210-211; Hungary, 

223; Italy, 136, 137 (map); Portugal, 

157 



Index 



613 



Empires, causes of decay, 28 

Empty Quarter, 66 

English-speaking peoples, 12 

Enos-Midia line, 296, 297, 308 

Epirus, northern, 324 

Eritrea, 140, 557 

Erivan, 452, 458 

Erzerum, 458 

Esthonia, 189, 362; area, population and 
internal affairs, 368; basis of new state, 
365; international position, 369; treaty 
of Dorpat, with Russia, 366; treaty 
with Latvia, 366 

Esthonian National Council, 362, 365 

Esthonians, 378 

Eupen, 124, 125 (map), 193 

Euphrates River, 76, 313; lake and swamp 
areas of the valley (map), 73 

Eurasia, railway lines (map), 377 

Europe, belts of densest population con- 
verging on Belgium (map), 120; com- 
parison of theaters of war — Napoleonic 
and World Wars (map), 121; eastern, 
Germanization, 189; eastern, socialistic 
background of democratic and nation- 
alistic movements, 394; German- 
speaking people, distribution, 186, 187 
(map); land seizure and division, 394; 
religions (map), 7; Slavs outside of 
Russia (map), 234. >See also Central 
Europe 

Exarchist church, 317 

Extraterritoriality, 512, 514 

Fairs, 473; Russia, 391 

Faizabad bazaar (ill.), 478-479 

Famines, Finland, 371-372; India, 49, 50; 
India, area (map), 51; India, danger, 45; 
Russia, 384 

'Far East, American trade, 498; bibliogra- 
phy, 596; economic resources (map), 
491; European relations, 490; Japanese 
ownership and influence (map), 494; 
racial factors, 492; raw materials, 
British interests, 490 

Far-Eastern Democratic Republic of Si- 
beria, 395 

Fashoda, 541, 558 

Fear, as cause of war, 348 

Feisal, Emir, 98; French opposition, 103 

Ferdinand of Bulgaria, 434 

Ferghana, 474 

Ferrer, Francisco, 1 16 



Fertile Crescent, 67 
Feudalism, India, 47; Japan, 493 
Fez, 154 

Figs in Palestine, 422 
Fiji, 200; labor problem, 531 
Finland, 173; Allies' protection, 374; bibli- 
ography, 593; history, 374; outlook, 
375; people, literature and folklore, 373; 
population, 371; population densities, 
371; resources, 370; Swedish coloniza- 
tion (map), 375; territorial problem, 
370; treaty of Dorpat, 370; water re- 
sources (with map), 372; Whites and 
Reds, 375 
Finno-Ugrians, 249, 373 
Finns, 371, 373, 378 
Firdousi, 462 

Fiume, 129, 132, 138, 255, 261; character 
of port (map), 264; D'Annunzio and, 
268, 269; field of trade rivalry with 
Trieste (map), 265; Free State of (map), 
270; Italian program and, 268; new 
boundaries in the region, between Italy 
and Jugo-Slavia (map), 270; water- 
front (ill.), 267 
Fjord, Norwegian (ill.), 170 
Flanders, waste of life, 119-120 
Flemish- Walloon problem, 122 
Flensburg, 176, 177 (iU.) 
Formosa, 490, 495, 522 
France, African policy, 547, 518; Algeria 
and. Ill; bibliography, 586; birthrate, 
87; China and, 518; coal and iron 
problem, 89; colonial aims, 77; colonial 
relations, 91; colonies, distribution 
(map), 93; decentralization, 89; demo- 
bilization, 80; eastern border prob- 
lems, 80; economic problems, 87, 88; 
industries and mineral resources (map), 
90; Italy and, 136; Luxemburg inter- 
ests, 89; Morocco and, 91, 105; move- 
ment of population 1901-1911 (map), 
88; needs, 87; new states of Central 
Europe and, 87; Poland and, 87, 355; 
political aims, 77; ports, regulation, 88; 
readjustment and reorganization, 77; 
relief map, 79; shipping problem, 87; 
Syria and, 92; tripartite agreement in 
Near East in 1920 (map), 103; Tunis 
and, 114; value in Near East, 97; 
war costs, 78 
Franco-British Agreement, 1920, terms, 601 



614 



The New World 



Frankfort, treaty of, 1871, signatories and 

terms, 600 
Fredrikshamn, treaty of, 374 
Free trade, 18; colonial opposition, 19 
Freedom, 191; Hungary and her border 

states, 230. See also Independence; 

Nationalism; Self-government 
Freedom of the seas, 10; Holland and, 178; 

Norway and, 169 
French Equatorial Africa, 535, 545, 553 
French Guinea, 517 
French Somaliland, 547 
French West Africa, 547 
Friction, 11; zones lengthened, 3 
Frisians, 174 

Frontiers. See Boundaries 
Fujiyama, 502 
Fundao, 156 

Gabes, 118 

Galatz, 294 

Galicia, 206, 208, 209, 344, 353; Eastern 
and Western, 344; oil deposits, distri- 
bution (map), 345 

Galicia, Eastern, 224, 240, 353; oil deposits, 
distribution (map), 345; oil interests, 
344; Poles and Ukrainians, 343; Pol- 
ish dominance, 344; Polish tradi- 
tions, 343; treaty with Poland and 
final status, 345 

Galilee, 422 

Gallipoli, 412, 416 

Gama, Vasco da, 158, 520, 539 

Gambia, 533, 554 

Game, African, wild, 550 

Ganges valley, 48 

Garine, 458 

Gartok, 488 

Gaza, 412 

Gellivare, 168 

Genghis Khan, 433, 477, 480 

Genoa, 135 

Geographical Review, ii 

Georgia, Republic of, 397, 398, 417, 434, 
440, 450, 461; area, population, re- 
sources, 457; Azerbaijan treaty, 455; 
special features, 456; treaty with Soviet 
Russia, 457 

Georgians, 378, 379, 453 

German Confederation, possible revival, 203 

German East Africa, 37, 199, 200, 532, 
533, 541, 542, 543 (map); parts ceded to 



German East Africa (continued) 

Belgium, 124, 125, 126 (map). See also 
Tanganyika Territory 

German New Guinea, 497 

German Poland. See under Poland 

German Samoa, 201, 497 

German Southwest Africa, 37, 198, 200, 
541, 548; character, 543 

Germanization, Baltic Provinces, 364, 368; 
Lithuania, 359; Poland, 336-337 

Germans, Baltic Provinces, exploitation, 
362, 364, 365, 382; distribution of 
German-speaking people, 186, 187 (map); 
eastern European centers, 187; exclusion 
from Germany, 191; in Czecho-Slovakia, 
192; in Hungary, 222; in Poland, 192; 
in Russia, 382; in the Tyrol, 192; in the 
Ukraine, 382 

Germany, African colonies, 541; African 
natives, ill-treatment, 548; Allied occu- 
pation, 205; Austrian cooperation, 187; 
bibhography, 589; birthrate, 87; broken 
spirit, 203; burdens of the new state, 
202; colonies lost by the war, 197, 198; 
contests against Slavs about 1400, 190 
(map), 191; culture, 203; democracy, 
192, 204; democracy and liberation of 
subject people, 191; European losses in 
consequence of the war, list, 193; Euro- 
pean territory lost, summary, 196; 
former commerce, 186; former unity, 
basis, 203; inability to pay costs of war, 
78; indemnity, 204-205; land division, 
394; losses by districts, generalized view 
(map), 195; losses in China, 196, 197; 
Morocco and, 107, 108, 110; new con- 
stitution, 204; new orientation, 186; 
Pacific realm, 521; Pan-Germanism, 411; 
Persia and, 465; population distribution 
in 1895 (map), 197; Scandinavia and, 
165; Shantung policy, 496, 518; trade 
limitations, 205; union with Austria 
forbidden, 192; union with Austria, 
possibilities, 214 

Ghat, 106 

Ghent, 122 

Ghizin, 71 

Gibraltar, 29, 147, 553 

Gilead, 97, 424 

Goa, 158, 160, 520 

Gobi Desert, 481 

Godeffroy, J. C, 200 

Gold Coast, 533, 540 554, 555 



Index 



61! 



Colder, F. A., quoted on Poles, Lithuanians 
and Russians, 361 

Goltz, Kolmar von der, 365 

Gordon, General C. G., 60 

Goritzia, 263, 264 

Gouraud, General H. J. E., 100 

Government, alien, 59 

Government of India Bill, 53 

Gradisca, 263 

Gran Chaco, 576 

Granada, 533 

Gravosa, 266 

Great Atlas Mountains, 111 

Great Britain. See Britain 

Great Moguls, 480 

Great powers, responsibilities, 2 

Great Wall of China, 478, 480, 508 (map); 
at Nankow Pass (ill.), 483 

Greece, 249; Allies and, 327; bibliography, 
592; Bulgaria and, 305; claims at end of 
World War, 316; Constantinople and, 
412, 414; Dodecanese and, 435; Greek 
world (map), 314; historical periods and 
rise to power, ^13; Italy and, 144; Mace- 
donia and, 316; northern, typical land- 
scape (ill.), 319; outlook, 326 

Greek history, 313 

Greek Orthodox Church, 249, 282, 286, 
382, 433 

Greeks, as element of Turkey (map), 426; 
change in ethnic character, 314; quali- 
ties, 315 

Greely, A. W., 174 

Green Harbor, Spitsbergen, 171 

Greenland, 174 

Grenada, 150, 151 (iU.) 

Guam, 522, 523 

Guano, 544, 566 

Guatemala, boundary with Honduras, 579 

Gustavus Adolphus, 167, 363 

Gyangtse, 488 

Hague Conference of 1907, 600 

Haidar-Pasha, 440 

Haider abad, 47; tanks, 51, 52 (map) 

Haifa, 419, 429, 440 

Haiti, 561, 564, 567, 569 

Hama, 70, 102 

Hamburg, 198, 200, 244 

Hankow, 197 

Hannorbar, 481 

Hapsburgs, 221, 235; Belgium, 119 

Harbin, 517 



Harbors. See Ports 

Hatred, 236; Balkan peoples, 298, 305 

Hauran, 422 

Hawaii, 522, 561; Japanese in, 524 

Hay-Pauncefote treaty, 567 

Hebron, 421 

Hedin, Sven, 487 

Hedjaz, 67, 103, 104, 441; importance, 70; 
King, 68 

Heligoland, 552 

Helsingfors, 371, 373 

Henry III, of France, 356 

Heraclea, 103, 434 

Herero war, 200, 548 

Herzegovina, 187, 207, 252, 425, 434; land 
problems, 274, 275 

Hindenburg Colonization Plan, 365 

Hindus, 47; in India (map), 45 

Hodeidah, 71 

Hokkaido, 504 

Holdich, Sir Thomas H., 570 

Holland, 119; Belgium and, 122, 123 (map); 
bibliography, 588; colonial power and 
policy, 176; disputes with Belgium, 178; 
districts wanted by Belgium (map), 123; 
foreign policy, 178; freedom of the seas 
and, 178; independence, 169; land 
reclamation, 178 (map), 179; World 
War and, 178. See also Dutch colonies 

Holstein, 174, 175 

Holy Land. See Palestine 

Holy War, 54 

Homs, 70, 102 

Honduras, 567; boundary with Guatemala, 
579 

Hongkong, 490, 510 

Hormuz, 68 

Horthy, Admiral, 225 

Household industries in Russia, 391, 393 
(maps) 

Hovas, 486, 551 

Hungarians. See Magyars 

Hungary, 189, 191, 206, 432; agriculture 
and industry, 226; Austria boundary, 
215; bibliography, 590; Bolshevism, 
224; boundaries and nationalities (map), 
217; causes of distress, 219; cereal 
production in 1900 (map), 228; emigra- 
tion, 223; farm animals in 1910 (map), 
229; German element, 222; Jugo- 
slavian alliance, 230; new state, 216, 
218; occupations by border states, 225; 
population densities (map), 218; pop- 



616 



The New World 



Hungary (conlinucd) 

ulalion growth (diagr.), 222; population 
growth in Rumanian (diagr.), 285; 
population movement in northern (map), 
239; population niovement in Rumanian 
(map), 284; population movement in 
southern (map), 252; population move- 
ment in west-central (map), 223; pro- 
ductions, 228; relief map, 219; Ruman- 
ian element, 222; Rumanian invasion 
in 1919, 291; Ruthenians, 221; subject 
races, 221; survival question, 219; war 
losses, 229 

Huss, John, 235, 236 

Hussein, Sherif, 68, 69, 103, 441 

Ibn Saud, 67, 69 

Iceland, 174 

Idealism, 8; Japan's, 506 

Idria, 137, 262 

Ifni, 553 

lUimani, Mt. (ill.), 575 

Illiteracy, Italy, 138, 139 (map); Portugal, 
156-157 

lUyria, 262 

Imbros, 321 

Imperialism, British, 28, 29, 30; Italy, 130; 
United States, and its effect on Latin 
Americans, 561 

Independence, 29; Afghanistan, 484; Afri- 
can peoples, 532; Balkan States, 249; 
Belgium, 119; Bessarabia, 288; Bo- 
hemia, 238; Bulgaria, 295; Czecho- 
slovakia, 232; Egypt, 61; Finland, 173; 
German subject peoples, 191; Greeks, 
315; Holland, 169; India, northwestern 
frontier, 484; non-Magyar peoples in 
Hungary, 216; question of disorderly 
peoples, 484, 485; Syria, 97, 98; Tibet, 
489. See also Nationalism; Self-govern- 
ment 

India, 29, 30; administration (map), 49; 
Afghan raids on border, 484; anarchy 
and disorder, 44, 45; British rule, 44, 
46, 47, 51; British rule, complaints of, 
52, 53; caste, 47; establishment of 
English power, 43; famine area (map), 
51; famines, 49, 50; feudatory states, 
47; financial policy, 53; franchise, 53; 
Government of India Bill, 53; historical 
relations, 43; importance to British 
Empire (map), 20; independence move- 
ment on northwestern frontier, 484; 



India (conliniied) 

international problems, 43; irrigation, 
50, 51; Japanese in, 495; Japanese trade, 
498; justice, delays, 52; land tax, 52, 53; 
monsoon rains, 48, 50; population 
density (map), 48; Portuguese and, 
158, 159, 160; racial and religious diver- 
sities, 46; rainfall area (map), 51; 
religions, 45 (map), 46; revised govern- 
ment, 53; rice and wheat distribution 
(map), 50; self-government, 48, 52, 53; 
South African relations, 39; taxation, 
52, 53; village organization, 48; wheat 
and rice distribution (map), 50 

India, road to, 55, 58, 70, 71, 72, 429-430, 
465; Red Sea route and sea route, 520 

Indian Ocean and Britain, 12, 24 

Individualism, 8 

Indo-China, 521 

Indo-Scythian invasion, 477 

Industrial revolution, 16 

Inner Asia. See Asia, Inner 

Innsbruck, 211, 213 (ill.) 

Inquiry, Commission of, ii 

Insects in Africa, control, 538 

Interlaken, view (iU.), 184 

International African Assn., 541, 548-549 

International agreements, value, 11 

International problems, i 

Irak, 72 

Iranians, 472, 479. See also Persia 

Ireland, 30; difficulties in settling the 
problem, 34; English attitude toward the 
question, 34; geographical situation in 
reference to England, 31; oppression, 
30, 32; political development in reference 
to England, 31; population distribu- 
tion in 1911 (map), 32; regulation of 
trade and industry in England's in- 
terest, 32-33 

Irish in America, 33 ' 

Irish Parliament, 33 

Iron, French ore and German coal, 89; Lor- 
raine, 81, 82 (map); Luxemburg, 84; 
Siberia and Teschen (with map), 346; 
Sweden (map), 168; world production 
and consumption in 1913 (cartogram), 10 

Iron Gate, 280 

Irredentism, 134, 305; minorities as a 
source, 287; Transylvania, 283, 285 

Irrigation, India, 50, 51; Mesopotamia 
possibilities, 72, 76; Moors in Spain, 
118, 152; Punjab system, 51 



Index 



617 



Islam. See Mohammedanism 

Ismail, 59 

Isthmian canal, 567 

Istria, 208, 259, 261, 263, 264, 269; eth- 
nography and boundaries (map), 262 

Istrian peninsula, 259 

Italians and Senussi, 57 

Italy, 129; Batum and, 451; bibliography, 
588; Britain and, 131; colonial gains 
(map), 141; colonial interests, 110; 
emigration, 136, 137 (map); finances, 
138; France and, 131, 136; fuel shortage, 
136; illiteracy, 138, 139 (map); imperi- 
aUstic program, 130; internal political 
and industrial problems, 136; Jugo- 
slavia dispute, 259, 262; Libya (TripoU) 
and, 142; mineral resources, 137 ; minor- 
ity Germans, 192; new boundaries in 
Fiume region (map), 270; peasants and 
land, 394; political indifference, 138; 
population density (map), 129; pro- 
gram and historical basis, 130, 135; 
promises made to, in 1915, 130; strikes, 
137-138; terms on which she entered 
the war (London, 1915, treaty), 263; 
trade, 141; tripartite agreement in 
Near East in 1920 (map), 103; Turkish 
sphere of influence, 434; union of Italian 
peoples, 136; Adriatic, claim to, 261; 
Adriatic control, 270; Adriatic, east 
coast, claims, 259; Adriatic, east coast, 
settlement, 269; African territories, 
106; Albania and, 141; ambitions for 
expansion in Europe, 130; armaments, 
139; Asia Minor and, 144; Austria and, 
130-131, 136 

Ivory Coast, 547 

Jade, 479 

Jaluit, 526 

Jamaica, 569; white control, 535 

Jameson raid, 36 

Japan, 490; Asiatic mainland and, 495; 
Australia and, 526; bibliography, 596; 
Britain and, 491; Britain's alliance 
with, 26; China, concessions in, 510; 
China, rights in, 497; Chinese Con- 
sortium and, 513; colonial outlets, need 
for, 502; former German Pacific col- 
onies, 202; future policy and relations, 
505; gains from the Russo-Japanese 
War, 496; idealism, 506; Manchuria, 
control of, 517; manufactures, 505; 



Japan (continued) 

modernization, 493, 506; Pacific pos- 
sessions, 521, 522; Pacific realm and, 
522; population density (map), 503; 
population pressure, 502; power in the 
Pacific and new relations to the West, 
522; promises, 505-506; promises as 
to Shantung, 501, 502; Russian alliance 
in 1916, 496-497; Shantung, 498; 
shipping, 505; social and economic con- 
ditions, 503; territory and influence 
in the Far East (map), 494; trade ex- 
pansion in Asia, the Fat East, and the 
Pacific, 495, 498; two modern wars, 495; 
United States and, 491; village and 
farms — typical scene (ill.), 504; World 
War gains, 497 

Japanese, 492; as colonizers, 524; as tropical 
colonizers, 524; emigrating tendency, 
492 ; failure at Peace Conference to secure 
racial equality, 493; in America and 
British Empire, 26, 27 

Java, 176 

Jerusalem, 412, 421; cosmopolitan charac- 
ter, 409 

Jewish Pale, 360, 380, 381 (map), 420 

Jews, characteristics, 381; devotion to 
trade, 421; Hungary, 220; isolation of 
colonies, 420; Lebanon, 100; Lithuania, 
360; Palestine, 418; peculiar position, 
420; Poland, 354; Rumania, 286; 
Russia, 380, 381 (map); Spain, 148; 
Syria, 98 

Jiddah (ill.), 69 

Jihad, 54 

Joint control, 547 

Judea, 97, 419, 421, 429 

Jugo-Slavia, 218, 249, 318; Albanian trou- 
bles, 257; bibliography, 591; bounda- 
ries in Fiume region (map), 270; boun- 
dary problem, 253 ; centrahzation strug- 
gle, 259; commercial treaties, 274; 
ethnic elements on the boundary (map), 
260; Hungarian alliance, 230; internal 
problems, 273; loans to, 275; mercury 
mines, 137; Montenegro differences, 
256; official name, 249; poUtical unity, 
257; population density and boundaries 
(map), 250; railways (map), 266; re- 
gional differences, 258; Scutari interests 
(with maps), 270, 271; separatist ten- 
dencies, 258; settlement of dispute with 



618 



The New World 



Jugo-Slavia (continued) 

Italy (with maps), 269, 270; Serbian 

dominance, 272; unity, 251 
Jugo-Slavs, 130, 132, 207, 209; occupation 

of Hungary, 225-226 
Jungfrau (ill.), 184 
Justice in India, delays, 52 

Kabul, outer wall (ill.), 486 

Kaiser Wilhelm's Land, 201 

Kalahari Desert, 544 

Kalambaka (ill.), 319 

Kalevala, 373 

Kalgan, 481, 482 

Kalgoorlie, 528 

Kantara, gorge of (ill.), 116 

Karabagh, 455, 458 

Karageorgevichs, 258 

Karelia, 370 

Karelians, 373 

Karluk Mountains, 304 

Karolyi, Michael, 225 

Kars, 452, 458 

Kars, province of, 450 

Karst, 263 

Kashgar, 477, 478, 482 

Kasr-al-Kabir, 107 

Katanga, copper, 127 

Katar peninsula, 68 

Kavala, port (ill.), 301 

Kehl, 84 

Kenitra, 110 

Kenya Colony, 42, 141, 533, 542 

Kerensky, Alexander, 387, 402 

Kermanshah, 463 

Khartum, 60, 62, 64, 65 

Khedive, 59, 60 

Kherson, 385 

Khiva, 472, 474, 476 

Khotan, 477 

Khroumer, 116 

Khuzistan, 463 

Kiakta, 482, 483 

Kiaochow, 197, 495, 497, 498, 501 (map), 

518 
Kiel canal, 174 
Kiev, 334, 385, 390; Dnieper plain (ill.), 

386 
Kigoma, 125 
Kilimanjaro, 542 
Kilo, 128 
Kindu, 128 
Kionga triangle, 157 



Kirghiz, 380, 472, 476, 478; military ser- 
vice, 473; Russian invasion, 473; steppe 
realm, 473 

Kirk Kilisse, 296, 318, 327 

Kitchener, General H. H., 60, 62, 558 

Kivu, Lake, 125 

Klagenfurt, 206, 226; plebiscite, 209; 
plebiscite area (map), 211 

Kokand, 474, 478 

Kola, 373 

Kolchak, Alexander, 403, 406 

Kollar, Jan, 238 

Kolozvar, 284 

Konia, 429, 443 

Kordofan, 62, 64 

Korea, 517; control, 498, 500; Japan and, 
495, 496, 498, 500, 506; population 
density (map), 503; terraced fields (ill.), 
499 

Koreans, 500 

Koritsa, 310; part of town (ill.), 311 

Kovno, 357 

Koweit, 67 

Kramer, Mr. (Czech leader), 240 

Krasnovodsk, 475 

Krasso-Szoreny, 290 

Kremlin, 383 (ill.) 

Kronstadt, 222 

Kuban, the (region), 398, 451 

Kublai Khan, 480 

Kufra, 57 

Kun, Bela, 225 

Kurdistan, 74, 104, 440, 444, 445 (map), 
465; British control, 448; treaty ar- 
rangements, 448 

Kurds, 429; Christians and, 445; mountain 
homeland, 444; nomad and sedentary, 
446; plundering habit, 446, 447; tribal 
organization, 448; Turkish government 
and, 444; typical costume (ill.), 447; 
village (ill.), 446 

Kuria Muria Islands, 71 

Kurile Islands, 404, 493, 522 

Kutzo-Vlachs, 282 

Labor, Australia, 529; Fiji, 531; new de- 
mands, 7; New Zealand, 531 

Lagosta, 268, 269, 271 

Lama, 487 

Land, Baltic Provinces, tenure, 362; Czecho- 
slovakia, 248; India, taxation, 52, 53; 
Jugo-Slavia, 274; Poland, 353, 394; 
Rumania, 292; Russia, present tenure. 



Index 



619 



Land {continued) 

394; Russian peasant and, 384; seizure 
in Russia, Poland, and other parts of 
Europe, 394 

Landownership in Rhodesia, 41, 42 

Lansing-Ishii agreement, 497, ii 

La Paz, 570, 574, 575 (ill.) 

La Plata estuary, 576, 578 (map) 

Lapps, 373 

Latifundia, 138 

Latin America, bibliography, 597; British 
and American interests, conflict, 26; 
British hold on trade (map), 20; decline, 
563, 564; economic development a 
need of the United States, 564; Europe, 
tides of business and travel toward, 565; 
European trade, 565; opinions social 
and political, 563; opposition to United 
States policy of expansion, 561, 562; 
Spanish interests, 566-567; unfriendli- 
ness toward the United States, 567; 
United States and, 559; United States 
anxiety as to encroachments of rival 
powers, 564 

Latvia, 189, 362; area, population, and in- 
ternal affairs, 368; basis of new state, 
365; international position, 369; treaty 
with Esthonia, 366 

Lausanne, treaty of, 1912, signatories and 
terms, 600 

League of Nations, 11; Africa and, 547; 
dominions and, 30; Japan and, 27 

Lebanon, the, 100, 435 

Leeward Islands, 569 

Left Bank of the Rhine, 82, 83 

Lemberg, 343 

Lenci, 270 

Lenin, Nikolai, 388, 389 

Lens, 193 

Leopold IT, 541, 548, 549 

Lepanto, 431 

Lettish National Council, 362, 365 

Lettland, 362, 363 

Letts, 362, 378 

Lhasa, 487, 488, 489 

Liao-tung peninsula, 495, 496 

Libau, 189, 369 

Liberia, 532; American interests, 558; origin 
and character, 558 

Libya, 57, 63, 106, 132, 434, 532; boundary, 
131, 141; Italian interests, 142; trade, 
143 

Liechtenstein, 185 



Lima, 570 

Limburg, 123, 178 

Liquor traffic in Africa, 549 

Lisbon, 162, 164 

Litani River, 422 

Lithuania, 189, 194; anomalous political 
situation, 357; books and language, 359; 
character and interests of the people, 
361; disputed boundaries, 360; eco- 
nomic basis, 359; ethnography and 
boundaries (map), 363; national senti- 
ment and educational movement, 358; 
Poland and, 328, 335; Polish union, 
357, 358 (map); possible Baltic Con- 
federation, 361; Russian rule, 359; 
Teutonic Knights and, 357; unsettled 
status, 361 

Lithuanians, 378 

Little Atlas Mountains, 111 

Little Entente, 241 

Liukiu Islands, 495 

Livingstone, David, 160, 540 

Livonia, 362 

Livonian Knights, 362 

Loanda, 161, 162, 540 

Locusts, 64 

Lodz, 349; British interests, 356 

Loess, 470 

London, treaty of, 1839, signatories and 
terms, 599 

London, treaty of, 1905, between Britain 
and Japan, 600. See also Anglo-Japan- 
ese alliance 

London, treaty of, 1913, 296, 307, 308; sig- 
natories and terms, 601 

London, treaty of, 1915 (secret), 102, 103, 
106, 129; Adriatic line and Italy, 131; 
Albania (with map), 308, 309; Italian 
terms, 263; line (maps), 260, 268; 
signatories and terms, 601 

London Conference of March, 1921, 417 

Lonnrot, Elias, 373 

Lop Nor, 470, 478 

Lopliks, 478 

Lorraine, 80; mineral resources, 81. See 
also Alsace-Lorraine 

Loubet, Emile, 580 

Lourenzo Marquez, 38, 161, 164 

Lower California, Japanese in, 492 

Lubeck, 198 

Lule Burgas, 296, 298 

Lussin, 261, 269 

Lutzelburg, Marne-Rhine canal at (ill.), 85 



620 



The New World 



Luxemburg, Belgian relations, 124; France 
and, 89; status, 84 

Macao, 158, 490, 520, 539 

Macdonald, General Sir J. R. L., 487 

Macedonia, 433; boundaries, 316, 317 
(map); ethnography — views of Ischerkoff 
and Cvijid (map), 317; present state of 
the question, 318; propaganda, region 
of, 316; Second Balkan War and, 317; 
transition region, 316 

Madagascar, 547, 551, 553; trade in arms, 
486 

Madrid, 145, 147 

Magellan, Fernando, 520 

Magyars, 206, 210; in Transylvania, 283; 
oppression of other peoples, 216, 220, 
222, 230; relations with subject races, 
220; Turks and, 221 

Mahdi, 60, 62; Golden Sword, 62 

Mahomet, 474. See Mohammedanism 

Mahsuds, 44 

Maidan-i-Naphtun, 468 

Maimachen, 482 

Makalla Sultanate, 72 

Malay Archipelago, Dutch and, 176 

Malay States, Japanese in, 495 

Malaysia, 521 

Malmedy, 124, 125 (map), 193 

Malta, 29, 431 

Manchuria, 496; Japan and, 505; Japan- 
ese control, 517; navigable river prob- 
lems, 518; New Towns, 512; railways, 
516; Russia and China in, 517; strug- 
gle for, 516 

Mandatary system, America, 458; France, 
91; Palestine, 418; principle, 546-547; 
Transcaucasian peoples, 454; two theo- 
ries of British control of protected areas, 
75 

Manganese, 385, 397, 398, 457 

Manila, 492, 524 

Mannheim Convention (1868), 84 

Maps, changing with history, 5; value, ii 

Marash, 440 

Marco Polo, 446 

Mariannes, 202 

Marienwerder, 194, 332, 339 

Maritsa River, 304, 320 

Marmara, 144 

Marmara, Sea of, 320, 417 

Marne-Rhine canal at Lutzelburg (ill.), 85 

Maronites, 92, 100 



Marseilles, 94 

Marshall Islands, 202, 497, 506, 522, 523; 
Japanese and, 526 

Martel, Charles, 149 

Masaryk, T. G., 234 

Maskat, 70, 485 

Massowah, 140, 557 

Mazuria, 345, 346 

Mazurian lakes, 342 

Mazurians, 194 

Mecca, 54, 68, 415; pilgrimages, 70 

Medina, 70 

Mediterranean region, British shipping, 
416. See also Near East 

Mehemet Ali, 59 

Memel, 166, 189, 192, 194, 357 

Menado, 524 

Menelik II of Abyssinia, 140 

Merchant marine. See Shipping 

Mercury, 137 

Merv, 475 

Mesopotamia, 67, 70, 71, 429, 434, 449; 
boundary with Syria (map), 424; drain- 
age, population, and boundaries (map), 
73; irrigation possibilities, 72, 76; Kur- 
dish village (ill.), 446; Kurds and, 414; 
oil resources, 72, 74 

Mesopotamian piedmont (map), 95 

Mesta, 152 

Metkovic, 266 

Mexico, disorder and effect on the United 
States, 568; German arms in, 486; Per- 
shing's expedition, 567 

Mickiewicz, Adam, 356; quoted on the 
Niemen River, 360 

Midia, 296 

Militarism, Czecho-Slovakia, 240; Japan, 
506; Poland, 348 

Military autocracy, 203 

Military service, Japan, 493; Kirghiz, 473 

Milner mission to Egypt, 61 

Minerals, production of 30 commodities in 
1913 (map), 9; world distribution of 
iron, coal, and oil in 1913 (cartogram), 10 

Minorities, Jugo-Slavia, 275; Turkey, 442 

Minorities treaties, 275, 305; Rumania and 
the Jews, 287 

Minority rights, 193 

Mixed zones, 5 

Moab, 97, 424 

Mogador, 110 

Moguls, 480 

Mohammed V, 433 



Index 



621 



Mohammedanism, Afghanistan, 483; Africa, 
534; Albania, 309; Arabia, 67; Brit- 
ain and, 54, 55, 57; confraternities, 
origin and aims, 56; Constantinople and, 
414-415, 441-442; Eastern Turkestan, 
478; Egypt, 58; holy cities, 70; India, 
43, 44, 45 (map), 47; Italians and, 144; 
negroes and, 54, 56, 534; opposition to 
Zionism, 98, 100; political force, 6, 54; 
Russia and, 378-379; Spain, 149; Tur- 
kestan peoples, 476; world of (map), 55 

Moldavia, 278, 280 

Mongolia, 470, 477; caravan routes, 482; 
China and, 480; extent, 481; Japan 
and, 505; population, 481; trade with 
Russia, 482; transportation, 481 (ill.), 
482 

Mongols, 404, 476; basis of conquest, 472; 
Eastern Turkestan and, 479; plunder- 
ing, 480 

Monroe Doctrine, 26, 559, 562, 564 

Monsoons in India, 48, 50 

Montenegro, 226, 249, 250, 251, 255, 284, 
298; Jugo-Slav differences, 256; land- 
scape, typical (ill.), 256 

Montevideo, 578 

Moors, 107, 145, 146, 534; composition, 150; 
expulsion from Spain, 148; Spanish 
reconquests from (map) 150 

Moravia, 243, 244, 245, 246 

Moravians and Czechs, 243 

Moresnet, 124, 125 (map), 193 

Morocco, 532, 535, 540, 553; agriculture, 
110, 112 (ills.); France and, 91, 105; 
French progress in administration, etc., 
110; French progress in occupation 
(map), 108; French status at present, 
107; new international agreements, 108; 
sketch map, 109; Spain and, 152; Span- 
ish defeat in, 146; Spanish Zone (map), 
155; Spanish Zone, value, 154; Sul- 
tans, 107, 110; three districts, 105; 
trade in arms, 486 

Morro de Arica (ill.), 576 

Moscow, 480; heart of city, with Kremlin 
(iU.), 383 

Moslems. See Mohammedans 

Mosul, 72, 102, 103, 104, 429 

Mozambique, 158, 160, 161, 164, 533, 541 

Mulai Hafid, 106 

Murman coast, 172, 398, 410 

Murman railway, 370 



Nagasaki, 490, 493 

Nagy Varad, 284 

Nanking, treaty of, 510 

Nankow Pass, Great Wall at (ill.), 483 

Nansen, Fridtjof, 405 

Napo River, 578 

Napoleon and Poland, 356 

Napoleonic Wars, regions fought over 
compared with those of World War 
(map), 121 

Narova River, 367 

Natal, 39, 40 

Nationalism, Africans, 532; Balkans, 251, 
252; central and eastern Europe, so- 
cialistic background, 394; Bulgaria, 
295; Egypt, 58; Hungary, 216; Ire- 
land, 32, 33; Jews, 354, 355; Lithuania, 
358; South Africa, 40, 43; Spain, 151; 
Turkey, 69, 440, 461 

Native rights, British treatment, 41 

Nauru, 202, 521 ; phosphates, 530 

Naval strength, 12, 14 

Nazareth (ill.), 423 

Near East, 58; Britain and, 55; Britain's 
growth in, 12; British and French 
policies, 415; British trade in, 415, 416; 
France, 97; Germany and, 411; in- 
fluence on civihzation, 462; Soviet 
Russia and Turkey, 461; territorial 
changes due to the war (map), 6; tri- 
partite agreement of 1920 (map), 103 

Neffet, 118 

Nefzaoua, 118 

Negeb, 421 

Negroes, Africa, 533; Mohammedanism 
and, 54, 56, 534 ; settlement of American 
negroes in Africa, 558 

Nejd, 66; Southern (map), 67 

Netherlands, Kingdom of, 119 

Neufahrwasser, 338 

Neuilly, treaty of, 1919, Bulgaria, 300, 303, 
304; signatories and terms, 601 

New Britain Archipelago, 201 

New Caledonia, 529 

New Guinea, German occupation, 201 

New Hebrides, 529, 547 

New world, character, 1 ; major problems, 1 ; 
problems enumerated, 2 

New Zealand, 29, 201, 520; immigration 
question, 531; Japanese in, 495; Japan- 
ese trade, 498; Samoan mandate, 530 

Newfoundland, 29 



622 



The New World 



Nicaragua, 561, 564, 567 

Niemen River, 194, 357, 359; as Lithuanian 
frontier, 360 

Nigeria, 41, 42, 533, 544, 545, 547, 554; 
palm oil, 555 

Nijni Novgorod, 391, 392 (ill.), 480 

Nile River and Delta (map), 61 

Nilotic peoples, 533 

Nish, 304 

Nisibin, 412 

Nitrate, Chile production, 573; Chilean 
fields and boundary dispute (with map), 
572 

Nomads, Arabia, 66, 67; Arabs of the des- 
ert, 104; Inner Asia, 470; Kirghiz, 
473; Kurds, 444; Libya, 142; Mongols, 
480; movements in Asia, 471; Ru- 
mania, 282; Syrian desert, 97; Tunis, 
116, 118 

Northmen, 167 

Norway, 165; maritime interests, 169; 
separation from Sweden, 169; Spitz- 
bergen and, 170, 172 (map) 

Nova Zembla, Samoyeds (ill.), 408 

Novi Bazar, 298 

Nuba tribes, 62, 64, 65 

Nyasaland, 533 

Oases, Algerian, gorge of Kantara (ill.), 
116; Eastern Turkestan, 478; Libya, 
142 

Odessa, 385, 480; French at, 451; part of 
harbor (ill.), 401 

Oil (petroleum), Alsace, 81, 82; Baku, 
385, 397, 398; Eastern Galicia, 344; 
France's need, 103, 104; Italy and, 136; 
Mesopotamia resources, 72, 74; Persia, 
464; Persia, and British interests, 466, 
467, 468; world production and con- 
sumption in 1913 (cartogram), 10 

Oil, lubricating, 555 

Oil, vegetable, 542 

Okhrida, 298, 310 

Olives in Palestine, 422 

Olonetz, 370 

Oman, 67, 70 

Omar Khayyam, 462 

Omdurman, 60, 62, 549, 558 

Omsk, 472 

"Open Door," 497, 510, 513; Manchuria 
and, 517 

Opium in China, 507 

Opium War, 510 ' 



Oporto, 156 

Oppression, 191; Czechs in Austria, 235; 
Magyar rule in Hungary, 216, 220, 222, 
230; Magyars and Rumanians in 
Transylvania, 283, 284 (map) ; oppressed 
as oppressors (Rumania), 291; Slovaks, 
244; tropical peoples, by progressive. 
564^565; Turkish policy, 430 ■ 

Orawa, 206, 347, 349 (map) 

Orient, American trade interests, 491. See 
also Far East 

Orlando, Vittorio, 268 

Ottoman Empire. See Turkey 

Ottoman PubUc Debt, 417, 437 

Ottoman Turks, 431 

Ouerten, 116 

Overghemma, 118 

Paciflc, War of the, 1879-84, 573 

Pacific cable, 524 

Pacific realm, 520; America and Japan in, 
522; Britain's power, 521; former Ger- 
man interests, 200; Germany and France 
in, 521; islands and European influ- 
ence, 490; Japanese and American trade 
expansion, 498; political geography, 
changes, 520; political map in 1914, 521; 
strategic importance, 524; trade value, 
524 

Paderewski, I. J., 331, 332 

Pagopago, 201, 522 

Palacky, F., 238 

Palestine, 70, 71, 418, 434; agricultural pos- 
sibilities, 421; bibliography, 595; British 
control, 418; French interests, 94; Jew- 
ish colonies in, 419; Jews few, 418; spir- 
itual influence, 420; Syria and, 98; 
water supply, 422; world relations, 419 

Palm oil, 542; West Africa, 555 

Pan American Union, 562 

Pan-Germanism, 411 

Pan-Islamism, 432, 433, 474 

Pan-Turanian movement, 474, 476 

Panama, boundary with Costa Rica, 580; 
Costa Rica treaty in 1905, 580 

Panama Canal, 581 

Panama Canal Zone, 523, 564, 567; United 
States and, 580 

Panlher (ship), 107 

Paper money, 79 

Paraguay, 576; boundary with Bolivia, 576 

Paris, relation to France, 90 



Index 



623 



Paris, first treaty of, 1814, signatories and 
terms, 599 

Paris, second treaty of, 1815, signatories 
and terms, 599 

Paris, treaty of, 1856, signatories and terms, 
599 

Paris, treaty of, 1898, signatories and 
terms, 600 

Peace treaties, confusion as to objects, 10 

Peary, R. E., 174 

Peasant industries in Russia, 391, 393 (maps) 

Peasants as steadying force in eastern and 
central Europe, 394-395 

Pechelbronn, 81, 82 

Pecbenga region, 370, 371, 373 

Pecs, 225, 226 

Peipus, Lake, 367 

Peking, 197, 482, 495, 514; Japan and, 498 

Pelagosa Islands, 269, 271 

Pelew Islands, 202 

Pemba, 552 

Perim, 72, 556 

Peroffsky, General B. A., 474 

Perry, Commodore M. C, 493 

Pershing, General J. J., 567 

Persia, 12, 24, 72, 74, 410; American posi- 
tion in regard to, 469; bibliography, 595; 
Bolshevists and, 461, 466; boundaries 
at present (map), 463; British interests 
and, 462; British progress (map), 467; 
European interference, 465; Kurds and, 
444; land and people, 462; mixture of 
races, 463; oil interests, 466, 467, 468; 
population, 463; population density 
(map), 464; railways as focus of rivalry, 
465; Russian and British spheres as 
settled in 1907, 465, 466; stronger gov- 
ernment needed, 469 

Persian Azerbaijan, 464 

Persian Empire in 500 B. C. (map), 463 

Persian Gulf, 71, 72, 252; German designs 
on, 411; Russian designs on, 398, 465; 
transit lands from the Mediterranean 
(map), 95 

Peru, boundary with Bolivia, 577; boun- 
dary with Chile, 572, 573; boundary 
with Colombia-Ecuador, 578; British 
interests, 566; race mixture, 563; United 
States interests and relations, 566, 567 

Peruvian Corporation, 566 

Pescadores Islands, 495 

Peshawar, treaty of, 484 

Pest. .See Budapest 



Petlura, Simon, 389, 402 

Petroleum. See Oil 

Philippines, 520, 522, 523; Japanese in, 524; 
Japanese trade, 498; United States con- 
trol, 548; United States trade, 492, 498 

Philippopolis, 295 

Phoenicians, 313 

Phosphate, 524; Mauru, 530 

Pilcomayo River, 576 

Pilsudski, Joseph, 331, 332 

Pinsk, 351 

Pinto, F. M., 520 

Piracy, Dutch East Indies, 178; Persian 
Gulf, 72 

Pirate Coast, 68 

Pirates, Barbary, 113 

Plata. -See Rio de la Plata 

Platinum, 385 

Piatt Amendment, 564 

Plebiscites, Dalmatia in 1919, 268; Klagen- 
furt, 209, 211 (map); Polish areas, 345; 
Saar district, 193; Silesia, 345, 346; 
Slesvig, 175, 176 

Pogroms, 420 

Pola, 207, 261 

Poland, 328; ambitious program, 331; 
anti-Russian feeling, 336; area, 353; 
army, 348; as buffer state, 189; Aus- 
trian Poland, 351, 353; bibliography, 
592; boundary complications (map), 
350; Britain and, 356; British and 
French interests antagonistic, 356; com- 
plex problems, 329; Congress Poland, 
192, 351, 353; corridor, 336; corridor, 
ethnography (map), 339; corridor, rail- 
ways (map), 340; credit, need of, 349; 
Czecho-Slovakia and, 346; Danzig and, 
provisions of economic agreement, 343; 
decline and partition, 328; devastation, 
350; eastern boundary, 334, 335, 350 
(map); ethnography and border zones 
(map), 332; extent, early, 328; extent 
in 1648 (map), 329; extent in 1740 
(map), 330; France and, 87, 355; Ger- 
man losses in, 194; German officials, 
proportion (map), 338; German Poland, 
351, 353; Germanization, 336-337; 
industries, 349, 352 (map) ; Jewish pop- 
ulation, 354; Jugo-Slavia and, 274; 
land situation, 353, 394; Lithuania and, 
335, 357, 358 (map); militarism and 
frontier problems, 348; minorities 
treaty with Allied, and Associated 



624 



The New World 



Poland (continued) 

Powers, 355; new republic, organization, 
331; new State, and Germans in it, 192; 
partitions, and evil results, 328; par- 
titions (map), 330; peasants and land, 
394; plebiscite areas, 345; population, 
annual increase (map), 353; population 
density (map), 333; population dis- 
placement, 350; pro-Russian policy and 
its basis, 336; Russia and, 333; Russian 
Poland, 351; Russian Poland, Jews, 381; 
Russian Poland, production and emi- 
gration, 352; Soviet attack, 1920, 334; 
Teschen and, 346; three unlike sections, 
351; wealth, 318, 349 

Poles, 192; attitude toward Russia, 378; 
'Czechs and, 240 

Polish books, collections, 356 

Political conditions, i 

Pomaks, 250 

Population, pressure of unequal densities, 
502; world (map), 525 

Port Arthur, 495, 496, 498, 500, 516, 517 

Port Jackson, N. S. W., harbor (ill.), 529 

Port Said, Suez Canal entrance at (ill.), 60 

Porto Re, 266 

Porto Rico, 569 

Ports, Czecho-Slovakia, 244, 245; Copen- 
hagen, 173; Danzig, 166, 194, 337, 341 
(map), 342 (ill.); Finland, 370; Fiume 
(map), 264; France, control, 88; Greek, 
304; international, 440; Kavala (ill.), 
301; Riga, 366 (ill.), 369; Smyrna, .322; 
Sydney, N. S. W. (iU.), 529; treaty 
ports, China, 510; Trieste (ill.), 130-131 

Portsmouth, treaty of, 496 

Portugal, 107, 147, 552; African policies, 
552; bibliography, 588; colonial poli- 
cies, 156, 161; "colonial self-govern- 
ment," 164; colonization, history, 158; 
democratic tendencies and problems, 
156; emigration, 157; expansion, present 
possessions, 157-158; India and, 158, 
159, 160; World War and, 157 

Portuguese, African exploration, 539 

Portuguese East Africa, 157, 158, 159, 160, 
161, 162, 532 

Portuguese Guinea, 158 

Portuguese West Africa, 158, 160, 162 

Posen, 194, 351, 353 

Potash, 557 

Prague, 236, 245, 216 



Prague, treaty of, 1866, signatories and 

terms, 599 
Preface, i 

Preferential tariffs, 18 
Pressburg, 245 

Princes (Principe) Island, 158, 162 
Prizren, 257, 310 
Problems, local, 7; major, 1; present form, 

7; wide extent, 559 
Proletariat, 388 
Prussia, 203; Slesvig and, 175 
Prussia, East, 194, 359, 360 
Przemysl, 351 
Pskov, 367 
Pskov, Lake, 367 

Punjab, 484; system of irrigation, 51 
Purcell, Miss M. A., ii 
Putumayo River, 578 
Pyrenees, 149, 150 

Queensland sugar plantation (ill.), 527 

Race, Australian problem (with map), 525; 
equality, 493, 506; Far Eastern problems, 
492; Latin American mixture, 563; 
South African problem, 525 ; yellow race 
in tropics (map), 526 

Radicalism, German Spartacists, 202, 203; 
Spain, 145 

Ragusa, 266 

Rainfall, Australia (with map), 528; India, 
area (map), 51; Inner Asia (map), 472 

Rapallo, treaty of, 1920, 129, 257, 269, 270; 
signatories and terms, 601 

Raw materials, Rritish Empire in 1914, 14, 
15; struggle for, 532. See also Com- 
modities; Minerals 

Red Sea, 520, 555, 557 

Religion, Balkans, 249; European religions 
(map), 7; in Irish question, 31; Jugo- 
slavia, 258; Magyars and Rumanians, 
285; political force, 5 

Religious wars, Bohemia, 235 

Reparations, German, 204-205 

Reservoirs in India, 50, 51, 52 (map) 

Responsibilities, 2 

Reval, 367 

Revenge, 236 

Rheims cathedral, 3 

Rhine River, Left Bank as a buffer state, 82; 
navigation control, 84; Switzerland and 
navigation, 181, 183; traffic, 196 

Rhineland, 82, 83; Allied occupation, 83, 84 



Index 



625 



Rhodes, 132, 141, 144, 321, 417, 435; Cyprus 

and, 326 
Rhodesia, 41, 537; Northern, 533 
Rice in India, distribution (map), 50 
Rieka VaUey (ill.), 256 

Riga, 166, 189; harbor, part (ill.), 366; 
importance as port, 369 

Riga, treaty of, 1920, 335, 390; Esthonia 
and Latvia, 366; signatories and terms, 
601 

Rights, minority, 193; natives, British 
principle, 41 

Rinderpest, 539 

Rio de Janeiro, 159 

Rio de la Plata, 576; estuary (map), 578 

Rio de Oro, 152, 154 

Rio Salado, battle of, 150 

Riyadh, 66 

Roads in Inner Asia, 482 

Roman Catholic Church in Syria, 100 

Rome, cosmopolitan character, 409 

Roosevelt, Theodore, 496 

Rotterdam, 123, 179 (with ill.) 

Ruanda, 124, 125, 126 (map), 542 

Rubber in Cameroons, 544 

Rubesi, 270 

Ruman language, 282 

Rumania, 204, 218, 249; Banat of Temesvar, 
273, 290; bibliography, 592; Bolshe- 
vism, 292, 294; border regions, 287; boun- 
daries, 281 (map), 284; Bulgaria and, 280; 
economic assets, 293 ; ethnography of the 
region (map), 279; France and, 87; 
French and Russian influence, 280; inva- 
sion of Hungary in 1919, 291; Jews, 286; 
land problems, 292; Macedonia and, 
316; occupation of Hungary, 225; 
origin of the state, 278; people, racial 
elements, 282; people of the homeland, 
278; population density and boundaries 
(map), 293; present conditions, 292; 
Turks and, 278 

Rumanian Hungary, population growth 
(diagr.), 285; population movement 
(map), 284 

Rumanians, 206, 216, 221, 282; in Hungary, 
222; in Transylvania, 283 

Rumelia, 295 

Russia, agriculture, low state, 386; Allied 
policy, 390, 391; Asia, advance, into, 
474; Asiatic designs, 398; autocratic 
government, 385; background of present 
disorder, 384; Baltic ports, 370; Baltic 



Russia (continued) 

Provinces exploitation, 362, 363, 364; 
bibliography, 593; blockage, 390; Bol- 
shevist regime, 387; borderland peoples, 
attitude, 378; bre;di-up, 376; Britain 
and, 55, 56; cereal supply (4 grains) in 
1913 (map), 400; China, trade with, 482; 
Chinese conflict, 478; coal and iron, 401; 
concessions in China, 510; cooperative 
societies, 397; Czecho-Slovakia and, 
239; danger of absorbing other peoples 
and lands, 376; disorganization, 431; 
Duma, 385; Eastern Turkestan and, 
480; economic resources of the Empire 
as of 1914 (map), 407; economic situa- 
tion, 391; Esthonia and, treaty of 
Dorpat, 366; ethnic groups, 378, 379 
(table); ethnography and larger natural 
regions (map), 380; exploration period, 
404; fairs, 391; famines, 384; Finland 
and, 374; German colonies, 382; Ger- 
man penetration, 187, 188 (map); 
Germany and, 201; government, present 
name, 387; groups that have broken 
away — table of statistics, 395; indus- 
trial development, 391; industrial mid- 
dle class, 385-386; inter nationaUst 
movement, 7; Japanese alliance in 1916, 
496-497; Japanese war in 1901-05, 495; 
Jews, 380, 381 (map); Korea and, 500; 
land tenure, 384; land tenure, present 
phases, 394; Lithuania and, 359; natural 
regions (larger) and ethnography (map), 
380; nobility, 382; old regime, 382, 387; 
peasant and land, 387; peasant charac- 
ter, 388; peasant class, 382; peasant in- 
dustries, 391, 393 (maps); Persia and, 
465; Poland and, 333; population 
density (map), 396; railways, 385, 393; 
reconstruction, 384; revolution of 1905, 
384; rights in eastern Asia, 516; serfs, 
384; Soviet industrial regime, 388; 
Soviet treaties (1920) with former parts 
of the Empire, list, 602; Sweden and, 
173; threefold war in 1919-20, 389; 
Transcaucasia and, 451; transportation, 
392; Turkish sphere of influence, 434; 
waterways, 392; wheat and rye, culti- 
vated and arable lands in 1910 (map), 
399 
Russian Poland. See under Poland 
Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic, 
387 



626 



The New World 



Russian Turkestan, 474; Eastern Turkestan 
and, 479; ethnography (with map), 476; 
land classification (map), 475; physical 
features, 475; population densities 
(map), 474 

Russians, adaptability, 403; Kirghiz and, 
473 

Russification, Baltic Provinces, 364; Fin- 
land, 374 

Russo-Japanese War, 495, 496, 497 

Ruthenians, 221, 240; in Eastern Galicia, 
343, 344; in Hungary, 224; in Poland, 
351 

Saar /listrict, 81, 193; future plebiscite, 86; 
in the treaty of Versailles (map), 86; 
international status, 84; map, 83; tem- 
porary control, 86 

Safarik, P. J., 238 

Sahara, Algerian, 111; Arabs, 533; dis- 
orders, 535; French, sand dune belt 
(ill.), 117; French development, 551, 
553; Libyan, 143; Mohammedanism 
in, 56 

Saima canal, 372 

St. Germain-en-Laye, treaty of, 1919, 134, 
181, 207; principal terms, 214-215; 
signatories and terms, 601 

St. Gotthard railway system, 183 

St. Helena, 540 

St. Thomas (Sao Thome) Island, 158, 162 

Sakhalin, 493, 494 (map), 496 

Salamanca, 145 

Salisbury, Rhodesia, 537 

Saloniki, 251, 256, 257, 296, 298, 327 

Salt in Inner Asia, 470 

Salvador, 581 

Samaria, 419 

Samarkand, 474, 475, 476 

Samoa, 521, 522, 523, 547; condominium, 
201; international rivalries, 200; New 
Zealand mandate, 530 

Samoyeds in Nova Zembla (iU.), 408 

San Francisco, Japanese steamers, 495 

San Stefano, treaty of, 1878, signatories 
and terms, 600 

Sanaa, 71 

Sand in Inner Asia, 470 

Sand dunes. See Dunes 

Sanders, General Liman von, 412 

Santa Cruz, 201 

Santo Domingo, 564, 567, 569 

Sao Paulo, Japanese in, 492 



Saragossa, 145 

Sarts, 476 

Saseno, 144 

Savaii, 201, 530 

Scala Nuova, 132, 144 

Scandinavia, bibliography, 588; commercial 
importance, 167; geographical position, 
167; German reconstruction and, 174; 
inhabitants (map), 166; neutrality, 165; 
present problems, 169; traditions of 
power, 165, 167. See also Denmark; 
Norway; Sweden 

Scheldt River, 123, 124, 178, 179 

Schneidemuhl, 191, 194 

Scutari, 311; Jugo-Slavia's interest in the 
region (map), 271; problem of the re- 
gion, 270 

Scutari, Lake, 255, 257, 310; drainage 
relations in the region (map), 271; 
problem area, 306; rival claims about 
(map), 271 

Sea, 559 

Sea power, British, 24 

Seattle, Japanese steamers, 495 

Sebenico, 266 

Self-determination, 10; Africans, 532 

Self-government, 28; Baltic Provinces, 
362; India, 48, 52, 53; Kurds, 447; 
Russia, 382; Siberia, 406 

Selim I, 431 

Seljuk Turks, 431 

Senegal, 547 

Senussi, 55, 534, 549, 551; Libya, 142-143; 
political force, stronghold, 57 

Sepoy Rebellion, 43 

Serbia, 249, 317, 318; Austria and, 308; 
Banat of Temesvar, 272, 273, 290; 
Bulgaria and, 302; Jugo-Slav state and, 
251, 272; Macedonia and, 316; race, 
249; special problems, 276 

Serbs, 216, 221; Albanians and, 257 

Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, Kingdom of. 
See Jugo-Slavia 

Serfs in Russia, 384 

Seville, 150 

Sevres, treaty of, 1920i, ii, 61, 113, 144, 
416, 435, 436, 437, 438, 439, 441; Pales- 
tine, 418; regulation of Straits, 417; 
signatories and terms, 601 

Shanghai, customs conference, 516 

Shantung, 197, 498, 501 (map); Chinese 
and Japanese interests, conflict, 500; 
Germany and, 496; German policy in, 



Index 



627 



Shantung (continued) 

518; Japan and, 505; Japanese control, 
498 

Shari River, 65 

Shat, 111 

Shatt el Arab, 74, 468 

Sheikh Said, 71, 72, 556 

Sheikhs in Tunis, 114 

Shimonoseki, treaty of, 495 

Shipping, British, 16; British losses in the 
war, 24, 25; French, 87; German losses 
by the Versailles treaty, 196; routes of 
the world (map), 17 

Siam, French and British spheres of influ- 
ence (map), 518; Japanese in, 495 

Siberia, 382, 471, 473; Arctic route to, 
405; area and difficulty of control, 408; 
colonists, exiles, and prisoners, 404; 
early Russian conquests, 403; Far- 
Eastern Democratic Republic, 395; 
Japanese trade, 498; Japan's hold, 504; 
local self-government, 406; political 
break-up in 1917, 405; republic in, 406, 
516; Russian colonists emigrating to 
(ill.), 405; Russian settlements in, 404, 
406 (map); transportation, 404; tribes, 
378; widely separated communities, 397 

Sicily, 137, 138 

Sierra Leone, 533, 554 

Sikkim, 487 

Silesia, 193, 231, 332; British and French 
interests, clash, 356; coal and iron de- 
posits and railways (map), 346; na- 
tionalities (map), 347; plebiscite, 345, 
346 

Silk industry in Syria, 94, 97 

Simla, Tibetan affairs arranged in 1914, 489 

Singapore, 490, 492; importance to Bri- 
tain, 24, 25 (map) 

Siwa, 57 

Slave trade, 161; Africa, 549; northern 
Africa, 142 

Slavic language, 249 

Slavs, 210; European, outside of Russia 
(map), 234; German contests against, 
about 1400, 190 (map), 191; Northern 
Slavs, 243; peninsula of Gzecho-Slovak- 
ia, 231; Southern Slavs, 249; union of, 
251. See also Jugo-Slavia; Jugo-Slavs 

Sleeping sickness, 538, 539 (map), 546 

Slesvig, 174, 187, 191; Germanization, 175; 
language boundaries (map), 175 



Slovakia, 242; land and people, 244; Mag- 
yarization (map), 239; products, 246 

Slovaks, 221, 242; oppression, 244 

Slovenes, 209, 216, 258, 260, 264 

Smuts, J. C., 29; party and principles, 40 

Smyrna, 144, 327, 435, 440; as a port, 322; 
British and French policies, 415; Greek 
and Italian clashes, 321-322; Greek 
claims in the region (maps), 314, 322; 
Greek control, terms, 324; Greeks of, 
321; new boundaries (map), 322; 
region, 442; trade, 415, 416; view from 
Mt. Pagos (ill.), 323 

Sobieski, John, 221, 425 

Socialism, basis of democratic and nation- 
alistic movements in central and eastern 
Europe, 394; Switzerland, 184 

Sofala, 159, 540 

Sofia, 300, 304 

Sokotra Island, 72 

Solomon Islands, 201, 530 

Somaliland, 72, 555, 556; Italian, 140; three 
political divisions, 556 

Sonnino, Baron Sidney, 268 

Souassi, 116 

South Africa, 29, 30; Boers, 35, 36; de- 
velopment of resources, 40; English 
beginnings, 35; nationalism, 532; ob- 
jects of present government, 40; poli- 
tical divisions and plant regions (map), 
37; problem of the Asiatics, 39; prob- 
lems of government, 35; problems of 
race, 38, 525; rivalries of unlike peo- 
ples, 535; separatist tendencies, 37 

South Africa, Union of, 543 

South America, British and United States 
trade competition, 565; frontier zones 
of friction, 570, 571 (map); United 
States business interests, growth, 566. 
See also Latin America 

South Manchuria Railway, 517 

Soviet Russia. See Russia 

Spain, African possessions (map), 153; 
Arab invasion, 533; arid and humid 
regions (map), 149; bibliography, 588; 
Catholic Syndicates, 154; church and 
state, 147; decline in character and loss 
of empire, 152; democratic drift, 145; 
disorders, 145; France and, 154; labor 
and the government, 153; language 
boundaries, 151, 152 (map); Latin 
American interests, 566-567; Moorish 
expulsion, 148; Morocco and, 105, 108, 



628 



The New World 



Spain (conlinued) 

146, 154; natural divisions, 148; poli- 
tical and economic situation, 152; pro- 
French Spaniards, 154; radicalism, 145; 
separatist tendencies, 147; small states, 
153; trade and prosperity, 155; United 
Slates relations, 155; World War and, 

147, 153-154 
Spalato, 264, 266, 268 
Spanish America, 155 
Spanish-American War, 152 
Spanish Guinea, 152 
Spanish Zone, 553 
Spartacists, 202, 203 
Spits, 206, 347, 349 (map) 
Spitsbergen, Norway and, 170, 172 (map); 

status, 172 

Stanley, H. M., 540, 548 

Stanleyville, 128 

Stassfurt, 81 

Steppes, 471, 473 

Storck, John, ii 

Straits, Zone of the, 409, 413 (map), 417; 
treaty provisions, 417 

Strasbourg, 84, 196 

Strumitsa, 255, 298, 302, 304; salient, 318 

Submarines, 21, 196, 202, 525, 570 

Sudan,' 60, 61; Arabs, 533, 549; Islamism, 
534. See also Anglo-Egyptian Sudan 

Suez, Isthmus of, 520 

Suez Canal, 55, 58, 59, 60, 61, 409, 430, 555; 
entrance at Port Said (ill.)> 60 

Sufjord (ill.), 170 

Sugar plantation in North Queensland (ill.), 
527 

Suleiman, 431 

Sulphur in Italy, 137 

Sultan, 414, 415, 425, 441 

Sungari River, 518 

Sunni, 444 

Susak, 261, 264 (map), 265, 270 

Suva, 531 

Suvla Bay, 416 

Suwalki region, 336, 360 

Swaziland, 43 

Sweden, 165; Baltic Provinces and, 363; 
foreign problems, 173; greatest extent 
(map), 167; Russia and, 173; separa- 
tion from Norway, 169; water power, 
iron ore, and forests (maps), 168 

Swedes, colonization in Finland (map), 
375; Finland and, 374 



Switzerland, as refuge and international 
country, 184; Austrian western pro- 
vinces and (map), 185; bibliography, 
589; frontier questions, 185; German 
and Italian pressure, 181; landscape, 
typical (ill.), 184; languages, 181, 182 
(map); political tendencies, 184; popu- 
lation density (map), 182; railway, and 
territorial problems, 181; railways 
(map), 182; resources, 181 

Sydney, N. S. W., harbor (ill.), 529 

Sykes-Picot Agreement, 1916, 100, 102, 103; 
signatories and terms, 601 

Sykes-Picot line, 70 

Syria, 67, 69, 70, 71, 419, 429; as transit 
land (map), 95; boundary with Meso- 
potamia (map), 424; British troops in, 
100, 102; desert and Arabs (ill.), 430; 
France and, 91; French position, 102- 
103; French principalities after the 
Crusades (map), 97; historical impor- 
tance, 92; independence, 97, 98; King, 
98; population density (map), 96; racial 
mixtures, 92; relief map, 99; united, 
possibilities, 104 

Syrian Saddle (map), 95 

Syrians, 429; deportations and massacres, 
' 459 

Szeged, 227 

Szeklers, 218, 222, 250, 292 

Table Bay, 540 

Tabriz, 463, 480 

Tacna-Arica boundary dispute (with map) 

572 
Tacna-Arica district (map), 574 
Taiga, 405 

Taiping Rebellion, 514 
Takla-Makan, 470 
Tamerlane, 477, 480 
Tanganyika, Lake, 125, 126 
Tanganyika Territory, 125, 126 (map), 

532, 543 (map) ; country and people, 542 
Tangier, 154, 547, 553; status, 105 
Tanks in India, 50, 51, 52 (map) 
Tarapaca, 572, 574 (map) 
Tariffs, preferential, 18 
Tarim River, 477 
Tarvis, 269 
Tashkent, 474, 478 
Tatars, 380 
Tatars of Azerbaijan, 380, 397, 434, 450. 



Index 



629 



Tatars of Azerbaijan {conliniied) 

453; Armenian and Georgian treaties, 
455; republic, 460 
Taurus Mountains, 412, 442 
Taxation, France, 80; India, land, 52, 53; 

Spain, 151 
Tchad, Lake, 143, 541, 551, 553 
Tea, 404, 482 
Teheran, 465; gate (ill.), 462; landscape 

near (ill.), 466 
Telavio, 419 

Tell, the, in Algeria, 111, 115 
Temes, 290 
Temesvar, 255, 272, 273, 284. See also 

Banat 
Tenedos, 321 

Terraces in Korea (ill.), 499 
Territory, changes due to the war (man), 6; 
conflicting claims in central Europe 
(map), 4; modern importance of dis- 
tant, 135 
Teschen, 206, 231, 239, 243; coal and iron 
deposits and railroads (map), 346; 
nationalities (map), 347; region (map), 
348; territorial division (map), 349 
Teutonic Knights, 362; Lithuania and, 357 
Thessalian plain (ill.), 319 
Thorn, 392 

Thrace, 416; ethnic conditions in eastern 
(map), 413; Greek acquisition, 320; 
Greeks in, 318; restrictions and obliga- 
tions of Greece, 320 
Tibesti, 551; region, 57 
Tibet, 470; area, 486; British interests; 
expedition to Lhasa, 487; British pro- 
tection, 489; frontier, definite, needed, 
489; Outer and Inner, 489; treaty, 488 
Tibetans, carrying merchandise (ill.), 488; 

hostility, 487 
Ticino, 185 
Tientsin, 197, 510; trade and population, 

512 
Tiflis, 456 (ill.), 461, 480 
Tigris River, 76, 104 
Tilho, Jean, 57, 551 
Timbuktu, 551 
Timok valley, 304 
Timor, Eastern, 158 
Tisza River, 226, 227 (map) 
Togoland, 199, 200, 5.33, 541, 547, 553; 
France and, 91 ; future, 545; old and 
new boundaries (map), 546 
Toledo, general view (ill.), 146 



Tondern, 176 
Tonga, 201 
Tonkin, 518 

Tordesillas, treaty of, 158 
Torontal, 290 
Tours, battle of, 119 

Trade, Asiatic, key to, 520; British ex- 
pansion, two theories, 75; British or- 
ganization, 16; British policy, basis, 26; 
conflicting principles, 18; Far East and 
Europe, 490; German colonial, difficul- 
ties of revival, 202; Germany before the 
war, 186; Germany, limitations, 205; 
Italy and, 135, 141; Japanese expansion, 
495, 498; Lisbon, 162; Spain, 155; 
United Kingdom export trade in 1913 
(map), 20; United Kingdom import 
trade in 1913 (map), 21; United States 
and Latin America, 26, 559 
Trans-Caspian railway, 475 
Transcaucasia, bibliography, 595; Bolshe- 
vism, 455, 461; British and French 
agreements, 451; British withdrawal, 
451; confederation, 434; differences 
and misunderstandings, 454; Federal 
Repubfic of, 450; internal rivalries, 450; 
local treaties, 455; new states, 450; 
new states and boundaries (map), 452; 
peoples, 396; race intermixture, 452; 
refief work, 452; resources and problems, 
454; Russian successive advances (map), 
451; single outside control desirable, 454 
Trans-Saharan railway, 551 
Trans-Siberian railway, 404, 473, 483, 516 
Transportation in Inner Asia, typical (ill.), 

481 
Transvaal, 36, 39; Portugal and, 161, 164 
Transylvania, 216, 218, 221, 222, 278; 
difficult terrain, 284; land problems, 292; 
Rumanians and Magyars in, 283; Sax- 
ons in, 189; timbered zone in Alps (ill.), 
286 
Treaties, principle treaties and agreements, 

1814-1920, list, 599 
Treaty ports in China, 510, 512 
Trebizond, 326, 440, 458; trade, 415, 416 
Trees, water storage in, 64 
Trentino, 132, 133, 134 
Trianon, treaty of, 1920, signatories and 

terms. 601 
Trieste, 138, 207, 249, 259, 261, 263, 264; 
field of trade rivalry with Fiume (map), 
265; harbor (ill.), 1.30-131 



*^ 



630 



The New World 



Tripartite Agreement, 1920, signatories and 
terms, 601 

Triple Alliance, 1879, 136; signatories, 600 

Tripoli, 57, 142, 434, 549 

Tropics, imposition of alien ideas on peoples 
in, 561^565; yellow race in (map), 526 

Trotsky, Leon, 388, 389 

Trucial League, 68 

Tsaribrod, 255, 302, 304 

Tsetse fly, 538, 542, 54(> 

Tsingtau, 501, 502, 510 

Tsingtau-Chinan railway, 498, 502 

Tuaregs, 142, 551 

Tundras, 559 

Tunis, 532, 535, 540, 547; French occupa- 
tion, 116, 118; relief belt (map), 113; 
tribes, 116; Turkish rule, 114 

Turanian stock, 474, 479 

Turkestan, 405, 470; peoples, 476. See also 
Russian Turkestan 

Turkestan, Eastern, 477; control, Chinese, 
etc., 477; Russia's interest, 480; trade 
and commodities, 479 

Turkey, Albania and, 306, 307; Allied re- 
ceivership, 439; army and forts, 441; 
Balkan countries and, 249; Bolshevists 
and, 461; Britain and, 55; Bulgaria and, 
295; business in foreign hands, 435; 
caliphate question, 441; "capitulations" 
policy, 435; causes of historic weakness, 
431; classification of peoples of Asiatic 
Turkey, 427; commerce of chief ports, 
416; compromises possible, 417; de- 
cline of the empire (map), 425; dis- 
organization, 431; division in 1915 and 
1916 (map), 102; Egypt and, 61; eth- 
nography, 426; European penetration, 
425; European possessions lost, 416; 
extent, 426; finances, 437, 443; First 
Balkan War, 296 ; foreigners in, and their 
privileges, 435; free zones, 440; geo- 
graphical environment and difficulties 
of administration, 426; glorification of 
national heroes, 433; German trade in 
competition with British and French, 
412; Greece and, 315, 320, 324; his- 
torical development, 431; indemnities 
and reparations, 440; international 
ports, 440; Italy and, 132, 138; Kurds 
and, 444; last remnant, 425; military 
expeditions and trade routes across, 429 ; 
Nationalist movement, 69, 440; navi- 
gation and harbor rights and concessions 



Turkey (continued) 

in 1914 (map), 436; new state, ethnic 
and economic basis, 442: northern 
Africa and, 113; policy of oppression, 
430; political corruption, 437; political 
rivalry, 436; population — especially 
Greek and Armenian (map), 426; pop- 
ulation densities (map), 428; public 
debt, 437; revolution of 1908, 432; 
spheres of influence of the great powers, 
434; Syria and, 92; territorial losses, 432; 
transit, freedom of, 439; treaty agree- 
ments as to lost property and as to minor- 
ities, 442; Young Turk movement, 432 

Turki, 478 

Turkomans, 463, 476 

Turko-Mongols, 476 

Turks, 305, deportations and massacres of 
Armenians and Syrians, 459; Eastern 
Turkestan and, 479; Egypt and, 59; 
Magyars' contest with, 221; two 
branches, 431 

Tutuila, 201 

"Twenty-one demands," 502, 510 

Twilight zones, 5 

Tyranny. See Oppression 

Tyrol, 131, 134, 185, 208, 212, 263; disputed 
territory (map), 134; Germans in, 192 

Ucciali, treaty of, 140 

Uganda, 125, 533; British protectorate, 
552; region (map), 538 

Ukraine, 335, 398; approximate limits 
(map), 350; as a political entity, 402; 
crops, coal and iron, etc., 400, 401 ; 
fertility, 398; German penetration, 188 
(map), 189, 382; interdependence of 
Russia andi 401 

Ukrainia, 224 

Ukrainians, 224, 378; in Eastern Galicia, 
343 

Ulster, 31, 32 

Unie, 261, 269 

Union of South Africa, 36, 37, 200, 543; 
white inhabitants, 38 

United Fruit Company, 579 

United Kingdom, export trade in 1913, 
(map), 20; import trade in 1913 (map), 
21. See also Britain, British Isles 

United States, Central America and, 567; 
expansion since 1898 (with table and 
map), 560, 561; export trade combina- 
tions, 566; Japan and, 27; Latin Amer- 



Index 



631 



United States (continued) 

ica, encroachments of rival powers in, 
564; Latin American trade, 26, 559; 
Mexico and, 568; opposition met in 
expansion, 562; Pacific islands, 521- 
522; Pacific, naval protection (with 
map), 522-523; pro-Irish sentiment, 33; 
Webb Law, 566; West Indies and, 569; 
world relations, i 

Upolii, 201, 530 

Upper Silesia. See Silesia 

Ural Mountains, 385, 473 

Ural River, 473 

Urga, 481 

Urmia, 446 

Uruguay, Argentina and la Plata estuary, 
576 

Urundi, 124, 125, 126 (map) 

Usambara Highlands, 542 

ijskub, 257, 310 

Ussuri River, 518 

Uzbegs, 476 

Valencia, 147, 150, 153 

Valenciennes, 193 

Valona, 144, 263, 308, 309, 310, 311 

Van, 458 

Van, Lake, 429 

Varna, 300 

Vasai basin, 128 

Vatican and France, 81 

Venezuela, boundary with Colombia, 577 

Venice, 135 

Venizelos, Eleutherios, 315 

Verdun, treaty of (843), 81 (map) 

Versailles, treaty of, 1919, Germany's losses 
by, list, 193; signatories and terms, 601 

Vienna, 206; sieges, 431; special problem, 
211 

Vienna, Congress of, 1814^15, 82; signa- 
tories and terms, 599 

Vienna, treaty of, 1864, signatories and 
terms, 599 

Victoria Nyanza, 553 

Villages in India, 48 

Vilna, 189, 355, 360, 363; Polish occupation, 
335 

Virgin Islands, 167, 174, 561, 569; Char- 
lotte Amelie (ill.), 563 

Vistula River, 194, 339, 393; improvement, 
342; Poles and Germans facing each 
other across, 341; Polish cities and 
(map), 337; Polish claims, 336 



Vlachs, 282, 317; in Balkan lands (map), 

283 
Vladivostok, 398, 406, 410, 500, 517 
Vlore. iSee Valona 
Volga region, droughts, 387 
Volga River, 393 
Vorarlberg, 181, 185, 212 

Wadai, 63, 65 

Wadi Haifa, 64 

Wahabis, 66, 67, 69 

Wallachia, 278, 280 

Wallachians, 282 

Walloons, 122 

Walvis Bay, 198 

War, 1, 506 

Warsaw, 328, 334, 342, 349, 351, 393 

Warsaw, Duchy of, 356 

Water supply, storage in trees, 64 

Wazirs, 44, 484 

Webb Law, 566 

Wei-hai-wei, 496 

Weimar, 204 

WeUe, 128 

Wesenberg, 367 

West Africa, 553, 554 (map), 555 

West Indies, foreign control and United 
States interests, 569 

Westphalia, coal, 89 

Whale oil, 172 

Whaling, 171 

Wheat, Australia, harvest (ill.), 527; 
India, distribution (map), 50 

White, Chief Justice E. D., 580 

White Mountain, battle of, 236 

White race, African penetration, 534, 535, 
536, 537 (map) ; in South Africa, 39, 43 

White Sea, 370, 373 

Wied, William of, 308 

Wild animals in Africa, protection, 550 

William I, of the Netherlands, 119 

WilHam of Wied, 308 

Wilson, Woodrow, and the Armenian 
boundary, 458, 459 

Windau, 369 

Windward Islands, 569 

Witte, Count, railway and other policies, 385 

Wittelsheim, 81 

World, population (map), 525 

World War, basic cause, 532; Belgium in, 
119; British debts, 27; causes, 8; con- 
fusion as to objects, 10; issues, changed 
aspect, 8; purpose, 131; region fought 



632 



The New World 



World War (continued) 

over compared with Napoleonic Wars 

(map), 121; reparations, 78 
Wrangel, General Peter, 389, 390, 403 
\N rigley, Gladys M., ii 

Yamasaki, N., 503 

Yap, 521, 524 

Yarkand, 477 

Yatung, 487, 488 

Yellow race, tropics (map), 526; white 

race and, 492 
Yemen, 67, 68, 104; geography of, 71 
Yenisei River, 404 
Yermak, 403 
Young Turks, 432 
Younghusband, Sir Francis, 487 



Yulinfu (ill.), 509 
YUnnan, 513, 518, 519 



r3 >^ 



Zafarin Islands, 155 

Zambesi River, 531, 541, 550, 553; basin, 
160, 162 

Zanzibar, 55, 160, 199, 533, 540, 552; 
German cities and, 198 

Zara, 255, 261, 264, 266, 268, 269 

Zemstvos, 384, 406 

Zengg, 266 

Zionist movement, 93, 418; Moslem oppo- 
sition, 98 

Zuider Zee, 179 

Zungarian gates, 475 

Zurich, treaty of, 1859, signatories and 
terms, 599 



ifcM^ 



^y V^'' 



^P,<N 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
015 910 519 2 ^ 



